One more time
by Gorrigan1978
Summary: Rossi doesn't like or trust the new female member of the team. What will happen when he has to work with her? Rated M for future content. First Fanfic so suck at writing summaries. CC welcome. Rossi/O.C. All done and dusted. I hope you enjoy.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

Supervisory Special Agent Finn Beckett walked into the BAU with her go-bag on one arm and her laptop on the other. She wasn't one to go anywhere without either of those things. Her friends found it hilarious. She found that it saved a lot of time when she had to be somewhere quickly. Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner saw her some through the door and headed straight over to her. He held his hand out and grasped hers firmly.

"Agent Beckett, it's good to see you again. How are you?"

"Eager to get to work sir." Finn looked over his shoulder and saw a row of people staring intently at me.

"Well in that case, let me introduce you to the team." He turned and approached the still staring people. Finn followed him. "We have SSA's Derek Morgan and Emily Prentiss, Dr Spencer Reid and I believe you already know our Technical Analyst Penelope Garcia."

Penelope smiled at Finn then reached over to hug her. She whispered something in her ear and Finn laughed. When Penelope finally let Finn go she shook hands with the other agents who all smiled at her, albeit apprehensively.

"Ah, yes and this is SSA Rossi."

Finn turned and smiled at the agent stood behind her. He didn't return her smile but did hold his hand out so she could shake it.

"Hotch, if I could have a word?"

"Of course Dave. Garcia would you please show Agent Beckett to her office and get her settled in? We'll meet in the conference room in thirty minutes."

While Garcia whisked Finn off to see how she had decorated her office for her friend, Rossi followed Hotch into his office. Hotch closed the door behind him as Rossi sat on the chair opposite his desk.

"What's on your mind Dave?" asked Hotch as he sat down in his own chair.

"Agent Beckett, what exactly do we know about her?"

"What do you mean? You've read her file."

"That's the problem exactly. Her file is the thinnest I've ever seen for an agent who has been with the bureau for as long as she has. The information in there is sketchy at best. She's been undercover for years and all that information is classified. We don't know how good she is at her job. We don't know how stable she is. I'm worried about taking her out in the field Hotch."

"Dave, believe me when I say that I shared your fears but I've spent some time with her going over her suitability for this role and I think she is a good candidate. I don't think there is anything for you to be worried about. Her expertise in the field has never been called into question. And besides which, her appointment has gone through Section Chief Strauss so she's here whether we like it or not."

"I just hope it doesn't come back to bite us at an inappropriate time."

Garcia was like a child in a candy shop while she was showing Finn what she had done to her office. Finn groaned inwardly when Garcia opened the door. Her office was festooned with cushions and throws and just about every kind of vampire bat Garcia could find. Finn loved vampire bats, especially cuddly versions but there were some things that were appropriate for work and some things that weren't. Still, her friend had done this to make her feel at home. She knew how nervous Finn was about starting this posting. Finn had wanted to be in the BAU since she started in the FBI and now, finally, the dream was coming true and that made her nervous.

"Do you like it?"

Garcia was stood in front of her practically bouncing on her heels with a huge smile on her face.

"Of course I do. It's perfect. Thank you."

Finn stepped forward and hugged her friend. They hadn't known each other long but they got along extremely well. Finn couldn't imagine a world without Penelope Garcia in it. Penelope picked up a cup from Finn's desk.

"I'll go and fill this with coffee for you while you get yourself settled in. I'll come back for you and take you into the conference room when we're ready."

"Thanks PG."

"You are more than welcome my lovely BFF."

Finn flopped into her chair and surveyed her office. It was pleasant enough and it had a sofa which would come in useful for all the late nights she had no doubt would be coming. She leant over and switched on her computer. Garcia had helpfully left her admin account details on a post it note on the screen. Finn logged on and put the post it in her wallet. She figured she'd forget what it was a couple of times before she got used to it and she couldn't go running to Penelope every time she had a problem.

Finn mentally ran through the list of the agents she had just met. She had read as much information on them as she could and knew most of it by heart. Aaron Hotchner, he was a unit chief with some problems behind him. Finn was surprised he had held onto his post for this long. Derek Morgan seemed outwardly tough and strong; a natural leader if ever she saw one. From everything Penelope had told her about him she felt as if she knew his life story although she had tried to not let Penelope's opinions of her new colleagues cloud her own judgement. Emily Prentiss seemed nice enough; a little caged but she was a woman so Finn knew that they would have a natural empathy with each other. Spencer Reid was so obviously a genius with a lack of certain common sense qualities. He was cute but not to Finn's taste. David Rossi was going to be the one who would cause Finn problems if she wasn't careful. She had seen the way he looked at her and the way he dismissed her as soon as he could. If she had read him right, and she was sure she had, he didn't trust her at all. She was going to have to work on forging a good relationship with him. It didn't do to have anyone questioning her abilities or not trusting her in the field. Everyone knew you had to trust your team mates in the field; you had to trust them to have your back or there was going to be a problem. And that just left Penelope Garcia. Finn loved the fact that she was going to be working with her genius friend. Hopefully that would make this transition so much easier.


	2. Chapter 2

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Two

It had been a manic few weeks for SSA Beckett. In the short time she had been with the BAU she had clocked up more air miles than she ever would have managed in her private life and had seen more horrific things than she ever thought she would. But, although she was tired beyond belief she was also happy. She had settled into the team better than she could have ever imagined. Or rather she had settled in with most of the team. She was still having problems with SSA Rossi and that didn't look like it was set to improve any time soon.

Finn leant back in her chair and pushed her hands through her hair. She tallied up the altercations she had had with Rossi over the past few weeks. After she got to five she decided she might as well stop counting. He had questioned her profiles and observations on many occasions; both in front of her colleagues and on their own. Hotch had started to pair them up more often than not which she realised was a vain attempt to improve their working relationship. It hadn't worked yet but she figured Hotch would continue until it did.

Hotch knocked on Rossi's office door and entered before getting any response. He wasn't looking forward to having this conversation but it needed to be done.

"Dave have you got a minute?"

Rossi put down the file he had been reading and leant forward on his desk.

"Of course. What's on your mind Aaron?"

Hotch sat in the chair opposite Rossi and cleared his throat.

"You. Well, more specifically, you and Agent Beckett." Rossi started to interrupt. Hotch held up his hand to silence him. "Dave, just let me continue before you bite my head off."

Rossi leant back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.

"I know you had reservations about Agent Beckett joining our team but I think that she has proved her worth over the past few weeks. Her profiles are correct and insightful; she has proven on more than one occasion that she has people's back. The rest of the team are starting to trust her and warm to her. I will tell you now that, as Unit Chief, I trust her implicitly. She has done nothing to suggest otherwise. In fact, the only thing I can see that is causing her problems is you. You need to put your reservations to the back of your mind and get on with her. The team cannot function if it is divided and currently you are the one dividing it." Hotch stood and turned to walk away. He stopped with his hands on the door knob. "You need to start getting on with her Dave. She isn't going anywhere soon and you need to get over whatever problem you have. If you don't, well the next conversation we have about this will be going in a very different direction."

Rossi watched Hotch walk out of his office and sighed. He knew she was going to be trouble as soon as he saw her and she had proven him right. He had no idea why he couldn't trust her or why he couldn't bring himself to be more than civil to her. There was something about her that rubbed him up the wrong way.

"My sweet lovely BFF, well one of them anyway," Garcia poked her head around the door to Finn's office. "We are going for a drink or three. Would you care to join us?"

Finn looked up from the paperwork she was doing. "I'm sorry sweetie but I already have plans for tonight."

"You know," Garcia came into the office and closed the door behind her. "He isn't coming. It's just me, my delicious hunk of love Derek and Emily."

"I don't know who you mean by 'he' PG but I really do have plans tonight."

"You do know who I mean. You're not stupid and neither am I. Everyone would have to be blind not to notice the issues you and Agent Rossi are currently having."

"Any issues that Agent Rossi and I are having will be ironed out eventually. And he is not the reason I can't come tonight. I have plans PG."

"Ok my sweet. It is up to you. Call me if you change your mind."

"I will."

Finn watched Garcia leave her office and breathed a sigh of relief. She only had one plan for tonight and that was to get extremely drunk on copious amounts of vodka and dance. She needed to release the stress that had been building for the past couple of weeks. No matter what she had told Garcia, the inability to form any kind of decent working relationship with Rossi was causing her anguish. She switched her computer off, picked up her belongings and headed for the door. It was a good thing that she had tomorrow off because she had a feeling that she would be spending all of it in bed with a very bad hangover.

Rossi watched Finn walk out of the building and let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. Finn stressed him out and his life was stressful enough. He really didn't want any more stress at the moment. He knew that Hotch was right and that he needed to get the problem under control but until he could figure out what the problem was it was still going to occur.

He made himself some coffee and went back to his office. He had a mountain of paperwork to get through and nothing to do for the rest of the weekend. His Friday night was going to be a quiet one.

Three hours later Rossi was still immersed in paperwork. The 'out' pile was at least bigger than the 'in' pile now which gave him some small amount of comfort. He had just topped up his coffee cup and told himself that he'd give it another hour at the most then he'd head home. When he got back to his office his phone was vibrating on his desk.

"Yes?"

"Err…is this Agent David Rossi?"

"It is. Who are you?"

"I'm sorry sir, my name is Daniel and I'm a bartender at Dante's nightclub. We have a young lady here by the name of Finn Beckett. She's had way too much to drink and has tripped and hit her head. She refuses to go to the hospital and when we were trying to find someone to take her home we found your card in her purse. Would you be able to come and pick her up sir? I'm just not comfortable putting Finn in a cab and leaving her to get home on her own and I've still got four hours of my shift left to go."

"Of course, I'll be right there. Just don't let her go anywhere."

Rossi grabbed his car keys from his desk and practically flew out of the room. That bloody woman was going to be the death of him. As if he didn't have to spend enough time with her at work, now he had to go and rescue her from some godforsaken club where she had got herself into trouble.

Security led him into the back of the club where he found Finn with a young guy he presumed was Daniel.

"Agent Rossi? I'm Daniel. I'm sorry I had to disturb you tonight but there's no way I can let her go home alone."

Daniel moved to the side so that Rossi could see her sat on the sofa. She was leant forward with her head in her hands. There was a cup of coffee on the table in front of her and a bottle of water in her hands. Rossi knelt in front of Finn and lifted her face up so that she was looking at him. She had a small cut on her head which had been pretty expertly cleaned and dressed. Rossi could see a lump already starting to form. She was going to have one hell of a headache tomorrow with the bump on her head and the hangover.

"What the hell are you playing at Finn?"

Finn opened her eyes and yelped when she saw Rossi in front of her. She looked from him to Daniel and back again.

"You called _him_? Jesus Daniel what is wrong with you?"

"What is wrong with me? For God sake Finn, you come in here, you spend all night knocking back shots of neat vodka, you fall over and hit your head, refuse to go to hospital, bleed all over me and then you shout at me for finding someone to take you home and look after you."

"I know. I know. But, seriously, couldn't you have picked anyone else in my phone?"

"I found his card in your purse Finn. And if you don't want me to call random people to come and look after you when you get yourself into a mess then you shouldn't come in here and mainline vodka. You're just lucky that I was behind the bar tonight."

"He's right Finn. And you're damn lucky that I came because if I didn't have a conscience you'd still be here on your own bleeding all over your bartender friend."

"I'm sorry Daniel. I'm sorry."

Daniel leant down and pulled Finn to her feet.

"Sweetie its fine. You know I love you regardless of how drunk you get but you need to take care of yourself honey."

Daniel put his arm round Finn's waist and pulled her arm around his neck.

"Agent Rossi, I'll help her to your car. She's a dead weight when she's like this."

Finn mumbled something into Daniel's neck but both of the men ignored her. Rossi followed Daniel and Finn out of the club. Once Daniel had put her into the front seat of his car and she was safely buckled in Rossi shook his hand.

"I appreciate you taking the trouble to look after her."

"Hey, man, it's no problem honestly. I've known her a while. I think she's great and normally I'd take care of her but I can't tonight. We're way too busy for me to leave early."

"I understand. Daniel, one more thing. Does Finn come here and get drunk often?"

"Not really. She hasn't been here for a while but then she's been real busy with her new job. Generally I see her once a month and she comes in to dance and unwind but tonight it seemed like she was on a real mission to forget something. I should have cut her off before she got into the state she is in. I'm sorry about that."

"Hey man, she's lucky you were here. You did a good thing tonight."

"Thanks man."

Rossi watched Daniel walk back into the club before he got into his car. Finn was half asleep in the front seat. Rossi slapped her lightly on her cheek.

"Hey Beckett, wakey-wakey."

"Hmm, what?"

"You hit your head. Are you concussed?"

"Hell no man, I'm just drunk. I only bled so much cos it was my head. You know head wounds bleed more than anywhere else."

"Well if you can string a coherent sentence together then you're fine."

Rossi put the car into drive and set off for his house. He had no idea where Finn lived and didn't really want to contact anyone else on the team to find out so he only had one choice. He hated to take her to his home and could see the potential for it to cause trouble but he couldn't have just left her in the club.


	3. Chapter 3

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Three

Finn woke up just as Rossi turned off the engine. She wiped her eyes, looked over at him and groaned.

"Oh shit." She let her head fall back against the headrest and closed her eyes.

"My sentiments exactly. Have you sobered up at all?"

"Well let's see. My brain is working, not too sure about my legs but my stomach does feel like it's in a washing machine."

"Great." Muttered Rossi under his breath. "Mind the upholstery."

Rossi got out of the car and opened the door for Finn. He offered her his hand to help her out but she ignored it and stumbled from the car. Rossi picked her bag up from the foot well and closed the car door with his foot.

"This isn't my place." Finn was stood looking up at Rossi's house, leaning on the bonnet of Rossi's car.

"No. This is my house. I don't know where you live."

"You could have asked."

"You passed out more or less as soon as you got into my car. What else was I supposed to do?"

"Can I have my bag?" Finn held out her hand to Rossi.

"Look will you just come into the house? You need some water, some painkillers and some sleep. You can be as fractious as you like in the morning."

"No. Give me my bag, I'll ring a cab and I'll go home."

"Agent Beckett, you know as well as I do that this is a situation that neither of us are happy with but you have hurt your head and even though you don't seem concussed you shouldn't be on your own tonight. I have a spare room and you are going to stay in there whether you like it or not."

Finn didn't bother to argue any more. She knew that Rossi was making sense but she wasn't going to acknowledge that out loud. Rossi put his arm around her waist and tried to help Finn into the house.

"I can walk just fine on my own." Finn shrugged out of Rossi's grip and concentrated on putting one foot in front of another without falling over.

It took Rossi half an hour to get Finn upstairs and into the spare room. Everything he did for her she fought him on. He managed to get her into the bedroom and sat on the bed. He went into the en-suite and started the shower running. He knew it was cruel but he was pissed and if he was pissed then Finn was going to end up fully clothed and in a cold shower. When he came back into the bedroom Finn was laid on the bed with her arm over her eyes.

"No you don't sleepy-head." Said Rossi as he pulled her arms straight and pulled her upright.

"No. Feel sick when I'm….."

Finn pushed past Rossi and dove head first into the bathroom. Rossi walked into the room just in time to hear Finn vomiting into the toilet bowl.

"Oh shit." Finn pulled her head out of the toilet and slumped with her head on the bowl. Rossi handed her a towel and tried not to grimace as she wiped her streaked make-up onto the pristine whiteness.

Rossi knelt on the floor next to Finn and pushed her hair from her face. She looked very different now to the Finn he was used to seeing. She'd wiped her make-up down her face, her eyes were bloodshot and her hair was stuck to her face. He reached forward and pushed her hair from in front of her eyes.

"Sweetie, what is going on with you?"

"I think I need to lie down."

"Yes darling, I think you do."

Rossi managed to get Finn onto the bed with a minimum amount of fuss. She was suddenly very pliant, as if all the fight had gone out of her. He left her on the bed and went to get a bottle of water and some painkillers. He wouldn't be able to get her to take either of them at the moment but they'd be there for when she woke up.

When he came back in to the bedroom Finn was laid on her back with one hand over her face and the other on her chest. Rossi pulled the en-suite door to, leaving a small gap so she could see where she needed to go. He put the water and the painkillers on the bedside table and switched on the table lamp. As Rossi pulled the comforter up to cover her up he noticed a series of small scars on her torso. Feeling like a cross between a pervert and a voyeur Rossi lifted up her t-shirt and gasped. Finn's entire torso was covered in small scars. They were different shapes and sizes but they all looked like they had been caused with something akin to a scalpel. Feeling even more perverted Rossi pulled his phone from his pocket and took a series of photographs of the scars. Something told him that this was going to be important. Rossi tucked the comforter around Finn and pushed a strand of hair from her face.

"Finn, what the hell happened to you?"

Rossi turned and walked towards the door as quietly as he could. The last thing he wanted to do was to wake her right now.

"David." He turned around and she had rolled over onto her side. Her eyes were barely open and he couldn't be sure whether she was entirely awake. She had never called him David before and the sound stopped him like a bullet. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." Rossi didn't turn to look at Finn, just walked out of the door and closed it behind him.


	4. Chapter 4

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Four

Finn walked into Rossi's kitchen the next morning fresh from the shower and feeling a little bit more than embarrassed. Her hair was wet and it stuck out from her head in a series of curls. Her head was throbbing despite drinking the bottle of water and taking two of the painkillers that had been left on the bedside table. She had stood in the shower for ages trying to think of a decent story to cover why she had gotten so drunk the night before. She couldn't tell him about the nightmares she had been having for the past couple of years or that she found working at the BAU more emotionally draining than she thought she would. Nor could she tell him that she found his presence and his close monitoring of her work disconcerting. She needed to talk to Penelope. Finn doubted that there was anyone anywhere who knew more about Rossi.

Rossi was sat at the kitchen table reading the morning paper. Finn stood and watched him; all the time thinking about how she would say thank you to a man who she really didn't get along with whilst trying to get out of his house as soon as possible.

"You don't need to stand in the doorway. You're more than welcome to come in and get a cup of coffee." Rossi looked over the top of his paper at Finn. She had found the sweats and t-shirt he had left for her in the early hours of the morning when he couldn't sleep. He had crept into her room and left them on the end of the bed. He had resisted the urge to take another look at her scars. He had started to formulate a plan then; a way to get her to tell him what had happened without her realising that she was telling him. He had discarded that plan at about six that morning. He felt for sure that she would see through it. After walking Mugsy until the poor dogs' slow steps made him turn around he decided that he would go for the up-front approach and deal with the outcome later.

"I'm sorry. I didn't want to disturb you."

"It's a pity you didn't think about that last night."

Finn went to the coffee pot and poured herself a cup of coffee. She loaded it with sugar and cream and went to sit at the table with Rossi. He ignored her and carried on reading his paper.

"Rossi, about last night…" Finn cradled her cup of coffee in her hands.

Rossi put his paper down and looked straight at her. The man was definitely one for eye contact.

"Go on."

"Look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean for you to be inconvenienced in any way and I had no idea that Daniel was going to call you. If he had mentioned it to me I would have made sure he didn't bother you but I think I was bleeding over him at the time."

"Finn its fine. You apologised plenty last night, you don't need to carry on apologising today. But, there is something you can do for me in return for me rescuing you last night."

"Ok." Finn sat back in her chair and crossed her arms in front of her.

A classic defensive pose if ever I saw one, thought Rossi to himself. This is not going to be pretty.

"How did you get the scars on your torso?"

"I'm sorry, what? How the hell do you know about them?" the answer dropped into Finn's mind before Rossi had a chance to answer. "You saw them last night didn't you? What were you doing? Having a quick look at my rack while I couldn't stop you?" Finn stood so forcefully she pushed the chair over. She turned to stalk out of the room.

"Finn please. Just listen to me."

Rossi was out of his chair and straightening the one that Finn had knocked over.

"Finn, just sit down and let me explain. I can promise you I was not checking you out while you couldn't stop me. It was nothing like that. I glimpsed them last night. Your top had ridden up and I could see them." Rossi figured he'd better leave out the part where he took pictures of them. "I just want to know how you got them."

"Why?" Finn leant against the centre island and hugged herself with her arms.

"Why?"

"Yes, why? Is there a bloody echo in the room? Why do you need to know how I got the scars on my torso? Scars by the way, that I did not invite you to see."

"Those scars are not just something random that happened. Now either you did them to yourself or someone did them to you. From what little knowledge I have gained of you over the past few weeks, you aren't a cutter so that only leaves the option that someone did them to you."

"How do you know I wasn't involved in some freak accident?"

"Because they are not random enough to come from an accident; freak accident or not."

Finn rubbed her face and massaged her temples. The headache she had when she woke up now came back with a vengeance. She had no idea what to do. There were very few people out there who had seen the scars on her torso. They weren't something she advertised and now she had the chance to talk to someone about them; to explain how they happened and to maybe stop the nightmares she had been having ever since. But the problem with that was she was already talking to someone about them. She had weekly appointments with a therapist and talking to her made no difference. Finn chewed her bottom lip as she contemplated telling Rossi what had happened. She could imagine the pity on his face and decided that she did not want someone she worked with to look at her like that. Besides, she was pretty sure that if Rossi knew, then so would the rest of the team. And how would she explain to Penelope that she'd kept something so major from her? Finn looked straight at Rossi; her face resolute. She stood up straight and kept eye contact when she spoke.

"No matter how nicely you ask the question you are not going to get the answer."

"Why? What is it you are hiding?"

"Agent Rossi, what happens when you are undercover is classified. The information you require is sealed. And it's above your pay grade; way above your pay grade. The only way you will get the answer is to go through Section Chief Strauss and I cannot see her giving you access to the files."

Finn walked back over to the table and took her bag from the chair.

"Now if you will excuse me, I am going to call myself a cab and go home."


	5. Chapter 5

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Five

"What on earth did you get up to on Friday night?"

Penelope Garcia came bounding into Finn's office holding two cups of coffee and dangling a food bag from her arm. Her mouth was smiling but her eyes were frowning; she looked worried.

"And a good morning to you too." Finn put down the file she was making notes on and accepted the coffee from Garcia's outstretched hand.

Garcia bounced down into the chair opposite Finn and fixed her with a steely gaze.

"I mean it my sweet BFF, I scored an early morning visit from Agent Rossi this fine morning and he is seriously worried about you. He mentioned something about rescuing you from a nightclub on Friday night and judging by the way you're styling your hair today I'd say you're trying to hide something. So, girly. Spill."

"There's nothing to spill PG. I went out, I got drunk, and I fell over and hit my head. Daniel found Rossi's card in my purse and called him. He didn't know where I lived; I passed out drunk in his car as soon as I got in there so he took me to his house. I slept alone, woke up, had an argument with him and left. I spent the rest of the weekend with a killer headache and stayed home."

"But I thought you had a date on Friday night? That's why you couldn't come out for a drink with us." Penelope sounded so upset.

"Oh PG," Finn stood and walked over to her friend. "I did have a date. It was just with a bottle of vodka and somewhere to dance." Finn sat in the chair next to PG.

"But you could have come out with us." PG lifted Finn's hair off her face and winced at the lump on her friends head. "Oh sweetheart. Are you ok? I mean, there has to be a reason why you went out and got drunk."

"PG. I'm fine. Honestly. I just needed to unwind and I'm best at doing that on my own. I'm not very good at spending time with actual people."

"Actual people?"

"You know, people that I like rather than other undercover agents and stuff."

Morgan rapped on the door and stuck his head into the doorway.

"Guys, we've caught a live one. Conference room in five minutes."

Finn and Garcia stood at the same time. Impulsively Finn reached out and hugged Garcia.

"Thank you." Finn whispered.

Three days later and Finn was finally in her own house. Not quite in her own bed yet but she intended to remedy that as soon as possible. The case had been a particularly bad one and Finn wanted to relax. Her first urge was to go dancing and drinking but after the trouble that had got her into last time she figured she'd better give it a miss. A bath and a cup of chamomile tea would have to do today. Finn filled the bath with bubbles and set the cup of tea on the bath caddy along with the book she was reading at the moment. It was some trashy chick-lit fiction that didn't require much brain power.

The doorbell rang when Finn was about halfway through her cup of tea. It was probably a good thing too because the bath had relaxed her more than she expected and she was starting to fall asleep. Finn groaned and closed her eyes again. She wasn't expecting anyone and if someone really wanted her they would phone her first. It was probably a door-to-door salesman who someone had let into the building. She wasn't getting out of the bath for that.

Finn slid a little further down in the bath until the water touched her chin. 'Sympathy for the devil' started blaring from her phone making her jump and bath water spill over the edge.

"Shit." Finn surveyed the water damage. Even more disconcerting that the amount of water that had sloshed over the side of the bath was that 'Sympathy for the Devil' was the ringtone she'd assigned David Rossi.

Her phone cut off as it went to voicemail and her doorbell rang again. And again. And again. Finn groaned. She didn't need to be a profiler to realise that it was going to be Rossi outside her door and he was certainly someone she didn't need or want to see.

Finn's phone rang again; vibrating its way off the bath caddy and onto the floor straight into a puddle of water.

"Shit."

Finn grabbed her phone from the floor and dialled Rossi's number. She didn't wait for him to say anything.

"Are you outside my door right now?" she practically shouted down the phone.

"Yes, why aren't you answering?"

"Did it even occur to you that you might be interrupting something? That I might be busy and not want to see you? That it was goddamn inconvenient?"

"No. That never occurred to me but judging by the noise in the background of your call you are in the bath so I'll just wait patiently outside your door until you come and answer it." And then he hung up.

"He hung up on me! What the hell? Jesus he's irritating." Finn kept on muttering to herself as she got out of the bath and grabbed her bathrobe. Rossi must have been able to hear her stomping down the hallway to her front door. Finn was pissed and she was going to let him know it.

She threw the door open and glared at Rossi. He stood and glared back. He had a folder tucked under his arm. Finn's stomach lurched when she saw it. She had a bad feeling about this.

"Are you going to let me in?"

"Well that depends on what you want."

"I just want to talk to you."

"Yeah right."

Finn stood back and left just enough space for Rossi to enter. He pushed past her and walked into her apartment. He made his way into the living room and sat on her sofa.

"I would say make yourself at home but it looks like you've already taken that liberty. I'll be back once I've stopped myself from dripping on my floor. Feel free to snoop cos I guess you're going to do that too."

Finn stalked off into her bedroom before Rossi could say anything. Rossi put the file on the coffee table in front of him and settled back into the sofa. From where he was he could see most of the room as well as having a view of the hallway. It seemed like a strange place to put the sofa but Rossi understood that it was only place to put it if you wanted to see all entry points for the room. He stood and walked around the room. There were no personal pictures on display. There were framed artworks on the wall and the odd knick-knack on the surfaces around the room. Rossi opened a door next to the window and found a dining room. It was still full of boxes waiting to be unpacked. Rossi was unsure of how long Finn had been in the apartment but he would have expected the boxes to be unpacked by now.

"Having fun snooping around?"

"You still haven't unpacked? How long have you been here?"

"What do you want Rossi? This is my home and you haven't been invited."

"I have something I need you to look at."

Finn sat in the same place that Rossi had vacated. It didn't look like she sat anywhere else really. Rossi sat on the chair opposite her and picked the file up from the coffee table. He opened it and took out some photographs which he laid across the table. Finn looked at each one and handed them back to him in a neat pile.

"So you got Strauss to give you the file. Well done. If I wasn't so pissed that you had managed that I would ask you how you did it. Obviously you know the full story now. I'm guessing you either came here to gloat or to profile me; neither of these options fills me with joy."

Rossi pulled more photographs from his file and handed them to Finn.

"Each one of these photographs is from the stomach of a different woman. There are six photographs in all. That's six different women that he has done this to. You are the only one to get out alive."

"And?" Finn put the photographs down on the table and sat back on the sofa. She pulled one of the cushions from next to her and hugged it to her chest.

"You know what I'm going to say next Finn." Rossi came and sat next to her on the sofa. Finn tried to move away from him but came up against the arm of the sofa. Rossi took hold of her hand and held onto it firmly as she tried to pull it away.

"No."

"Finn, there's a serial killer out there and you have first-hand knowledge of him. We need you to help us profile him. We need you to help us catch him. You owe it to yourself to do this."

"I owe nobody anything. That information was classified. Now I have no idea how you managed to get hold of it and I really don't want to know but if you're going to take this to the team you are going to have to do it without me. That time; that piece of my life is off limits to everyone and that definitely includes you Agent Rossi."

Finn wrenched her hand from his and stepped over the coffee table. Rossi stood so he was in front of her. She folded her arms and looked down at her feet.

"Finn, I am going to take this to the team regardless of whether you come in or not. This unsub needs to be stopped. You have information that can help us do that. You know what you need to do. You know what's right. The team are assembling now. We need you on this one Finn."

Finn took a deep breath and pulled herself up to her full height.

"Agent Rossi, I would like you to leave my home now. You are no longer welcome here. You can take what you like to the team but I will not be involved in this case."

Rossi walked down the hallway with Finn following him. He opened the door and stepped over the threshold. He turned to face Finn.

"Finn you know where we'll be. I'm going to keep you updated regardless. You know what you need to do."

Finn slammed the door in Rossi's face and leant back against it. She slid to the floor, tears coursing down her face. No matter what David Rossi said or thought, there was no way she could re-live all that again. It was bad enough going through it for the debriefing and she would be damned if she was going to go through it again because David Rossi was on a crusade.


	6. Chapter 6

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Six

Everyone had gathered in the conference room by the time Rossi got into work. He stopped off in his office and gathered up the other copies of the file he had compiled. Part of him didn't want to go through all this with the team but part of him knew that it needed to be done. He'd have to explain how he saw the scars on Finn's torso and how he had managed to gather the information. Plus he'd have to explain to Hotch why Finn wasn't there with them trying to catch the unsub. He took a deep breath, straightened his shoulders and walked into the conference room. All eyes turned to him as he walked around the table handing out the folders. He picked the remote up from the table and pulled up a series of images. Garcia averted her eyes as usual but listened intently to him.

"These images were taken over the last six months in Reno Nevada. Seven women; six bodies. One female, each taken one month apart, each found on the edges of Lake Tahoe. Each of them appeared to have been strangled to death. The scars you see on their torso were done anti-mortem. These are only the ones Reno PD know about. There may be many many more."

"Have Reno PD asked for our help?" Hotch's voice came from the back of the room.

"Not yet but I'm working on that."

"These scars look like they're supposed to form some sort of pattern." said Reid as he held the photos in front of him. "Do we know what it's supposed to be?"

"Hang on a second Rossi," piped up Morgan. "How do you know about this if Reno PD haven't contacted us to help yet?"

"And you said there were seven women but only six bodies. Who's the seventh Dave?" asked Hotch.

"That would be me."

Everyone one in the room turned to face Finn as she stood framed in the doorway. As Finn looked at the faces in front of her she saw a mixture of shock, confusion and then the one she didn't want to see, pity. Finn walked into the room and sat in the chair Rossi offered her. He squeezed her shoulder and sat in the chair next to her.

"Finn, are you sure you want to do this here?" asked Hotch.

"To be honest Hotch I don't want to do this anywhere but seeing as Rossi has already opened this can of worms I might as well get this over and done with."

Garcia put an open bottle of water on the table in front of Finn and clasped her right hand. Finn took a drink of water and cleared her throat.

"Just over two years ago I was undercover in Reno. I was working with my partner Dan. We'd worked together so many times before that we could pass easily as man and wife. We were in a bar when we got talking to a guy at the table next to us. He seemed harmless enough. Dan extracted as much information from him as he could and we passed it onto our handlers. He came back clean so when we met him in the same bar a week later we weren't concerned. We should have been. When we got back to the house we were sharing I sent Dan outside with the trash while I filled the dishwasher. I heard a crash from the utility room and called out to ask him what he'd broken now. When he didn't respond I went into the utility room to check on him. He was lying on his back in a pool of blood. From what I could see it looked like his throat had been cut. I ran towards him but the unsub was in front of me. He pushed me back into the kitchen. My gun was in the sideboard in the living room. I tried to lunge past him to get it but he was quicker than me. He hit me across my face and I hit the door frame as I went down. The last thing I remember was him putting something over my face."

Finn stopped speaking to have a drink of water and take the tissue that Rossi offered her. She hadn't even realised she was crying until then. She looked at the people crowded around the table. Penelope was crying too; big silent tears were falling down her face. Morgan pulled his chair up next to her and gave her a tissue. Prentiss was fiddling with her pen and looking everywhere but at Finn. Reid was sat staring at Finn like she was someone he'd never met before. Hotch was pacing around the room. Only Rossi looked entirely composed.

Well he would be, thought Finn to herself, he's got what he wants.

Hotch came to a stop in front of Finn and knelt in front of her.

"Finn we don't have to do this now. You can take some time and compose yourself. I know this can't be easy for you." Hotch held onto Finn's hand but he wasn't looking at her. He was glaring at Rossi but Rossi stayed looking as composed as ever.

"No. This needs to be done now. If we stand a chance of catching him. I'm fine. Honestly." Finn squeezed his hand and hoped that she sounded more convincing than she felt.

"Ok. If you're sure." Hotch stood and went back to his pacing. Finn took a deep breath and carried on.

"When I came round I was somewhere I didn't recognise. He had stripped me to my underwear and had tied me to a bed. When he came back into the room he was carrying a tray like the ones they have in operating theatres. I could hear things sliding round on it but I couldn't see what they were. I tried speaking to him; tried to humanise myself. I told him about my childhood, about my parents but it didn't work. I don't know whether he tuned me out or not. All the time I was talking to him he was muttering under his breath. I don't know what he was saying. He was too quiet and all I could really hear was a voice in my head telling me I had to get out of there. He pulled a marker pen from the tray and started to draw on my stomach. I strained to try and see what it was but I couldn't tell. When he put the pen back I tried talking to him again but he backhanded me across the face. When my head stopped ringing I opened my eyes and then wished I hadn't. He'd swapped the marker pen for a scalpel. I was crying; half hysterical and hyperventilating. I tried telling him that he didn't need to do this but he wasn't listening. He started tracing the pattern on my stomach with the scalpel. I screamed. It hurt so much and I didn't know what else to do."

"Ok this needs to stop now." Hotch stood and came over to Finn. "We don't need Finn to do this. Everything is in the report. Wheels up in one hour people."

"Hotch. I can do this. There's not much left to tell and if you keep interrupting me it's going to take even longer." Hotch looked taken aback but he could see the determination in her eyes. He pulled his chair up beside Finn and took her hand. Finn looked at their hands entwined on her lap and silent tears coursed down her face. These were her colleagues; hopefully her friends and they needed to know this.

"I passed out with the pain and when I woke up he had dressed my stomach and gone. I don't know how long i was alone before he came back but I knew that I needed to get out of there as soon as possible.

"I asked him to let me up so I could have a drink. I didn't think he'd be that stupid to be honest but he was. Either that or he was too goddamned arrogant to think I'd try anything. It was surprisingly easy to overpower him. Before I even knew what I'd done he was on the floor and I was on top of him and banging his head against the floor. He ripped the bandages off my stomach and scratched at my wounds. I could feel his fingers digging into my stomach and it hurt like hell but I didn't let go of his head. I kept on banging it against the floor. I think I felt his skull crack rather than heard it but I can't be sure. All I know is that when I ran out of that house he wasn't conscious. There were two trucks outside but neither of them had keys in and I didn't dare stop long enough to hot-wire them so I started running. A mile or so down the road I ran into a police officer. Literally ran into him and gave him the fright of his life. Poor guy was confronted with a hysterical woman wearing nothing but her underwear and covered in blood. I managed to give him my name and FBI status and then I passed out in his arms. When I woke up my handler was in the room with me. She told me that they had found the house but it was empty. There was no sign of him anywhere. I should have carried on beating him till he was dead."

"Wasn't there an investigation? I mean they should have looked for him." asked Reid.

"There was," Rossi stood and indicated to the folders in front of them all. "The details are all in there."

"Right people. Wheels up in one hour. Penelope stays with Finn. You're not to let her out of your sight until we get back. Derek get in touch with Reno PD and politely tell them we are helping out in their investigation. Spencer and Emily try and find everything you can about possible related cases. Dave wait for me in my office. I want a word with you."

Everyone filed out of the office apart from Hotch and Garcia.

"We will catch him Finn. I promise." Hotch stood and walked out of the room without saying another word.

Finn looked over at Penelope who was still crying silent tears.

"I'm sorry." whispered Finn.

"You're sorry? What on earth are you sorry for?"

"For not telling you. For letting you find out like this. It's not that I didn't want to tell you about it it's just that if I did then it'd all seem more real. I've spent so long ignoring what had happened, not looking at myself and trying to tell myself that nothing had happened that I didn't want to risk making it real. I didn't know if I'd be able to handle it."

"Well my sweet BFF not only did you handle it but you kicked its ass." Penelope reached over and wiped the tears from Finn's face. "And if anyone is going to catch this sick bastard then it will be these guys. And you are not going to leave my sight. SSA Hotchner put me in charge of you and I'm going to look after you so well."

"Yeah about that PG. I'm going with them. I can't sit here and wait for news. It'd drive both of us mad. And besides you need to be able to do your genius thing without worrying about me."

Hotch stormed into his office and slammed the door behind him.

"I wouldn't like to be Rossi right now." said Derek who was still on hold with Reno PD.

"Are you surprised?" asked Emily. "Rossi was bringing that case to the table regardless of Finn wanting it or not. You saw the smirk on his face when she turned up. He knew he was right. Hotch is right to tear a strip off him."

"All Agent Rossi was doing was making sure we were going to catch a killer." said Reid quietly.

"Seriously Reid? Don't tell me you agree with his methods? You saw Finn in there. She's a mess and Rossi is to blame for that." Emily rounded on Spencer with such ferocity that he cowered back in his seat.

"No I don't agree with his methods but we have a job to do regardless of how much it hurts one of us."

Rossi flinched in his chair when Hotch slammed the door. He knew there'd be some comeback for this but he didn't imagine it would be this soon or that Hotch would be so pissed.

"If we didn't need you on this case so much Dave I'd suspend you and send you home right now. What you did to a fellow agent, to a friend was inexcusable."

"I did what needed to be done. We have a serial killer on our hands and he needs to be stopped. Agent Beckett is the only victim to get away from him. We needed her testimony."

"Testimony that she wasn't ready or equipped to give. I'd be surprised if she ever comes back from this. You may well have irreparably damaged another agent and a damn good one at that. When we get back from Reno you're going to take a few days to think about that whether you like it or not."

"I stand by what I did Hotch and if I had to do it again I would do the same thing."

"Do you know I sometimes wonder if you have any feelings at all?"

"And I sometimes wonder if you have too many."

Both men jumped at the knock on the door.

"What is it?" Hotch growled. He couldn't hide the surprise on his face when Finn stood there. She looked entirely composed and in control. Unless you'd been in that room with her you'd never know what she had just recounted. Finn walked into the office and stood beside Rossi.

"Sir I want to go to Reno with you and the team. I need closure on this. It's been dominating my life for far too long. And besides which you'll need me there. I'm part of the team and we go together."

Hotch was stunned but he recovered quickly.

"If that's what you want Agent Beckett."

"It is sir."

Finn turned and walked out of the office without another word.

"She's a strong woman that one." said Rossi as he stood to leave.

"For your sake Dave I hope you're right."

**I am a little bit stuck as to where to go now. I know where I want the story to go but don't know enough about the logistics about how the operation would go down. I'm tempted to gloss over it and cut to the plane afterwards. Do you think this would work? Suggestions welcome.**

**Thank you for reading and reviewing. It's appreciated.**


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

They filed into two SUV's and headed to the airport. Morgan and Garcia made sure that Rossi was in a different car to Finn. Judging by the looks he was getting from the rest of the team, Rossi was going to have to pull something special from his hat to win them over again. Rossi was sat up front with Hotch; Reid, Prentiss, Garcia, Morgan and Finn were squashed into the other car. Rossi leant his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. He saw Finn staring at him as she was ushered into the car by Morgan. The look on her face was a mixture of disappointment and sadness. Rossi felt a roiling sensation in his stomach; that would be the guilt he thought to himself. He hated that he had just put her through one of the most traumatic moments of her life but, no matter what was said to him or thought about him, he was not going to change his mind that what he did was right. There was a serial killer out there and Finn had information that could catch him and keep him behind bars.

Finn was squashed in the back of the car between Penelope and Emily. Penelope was holding her hand in a vice-like grip as if letting it go would somehow cause Finn irreparable damage. Morgan was driving with Reid next to him. No one was speaking; the car was filled with total silence and it was driving Finn nuts.

"Will someone say something please?" Finn had intended for her voice to be strong but the question came out like a whisper. "Stop treating me like a victim. I'm the same person I always have been. This silence isn't really helping me. I know you're all still trying to process what I told you but what I really need right now is some semblance of normality."

"I think the reason no one is speaking is because no one knows what to say to you to make any of this feel better." Reid twisted in his seat and looked at Finn. "We don't want to make you feel any worse than you already do so we're taking the easy way out."

"Well you're all going to have to suck it up and get on with your jobs because whether we like it or not, we are on a way to catch a serial killer. It's no different to any of the cases we've all dealt with before."

"You're wrong sweetie," said Penelope. "This isn't like any of the cases we've dealt with before. This involves one of our own."

"And when you were shot, that case involved one of your own. You have done this before and you need to do it again." Finn turned to Penelope. "PG, you told me that you didn't want to be treat like a victim when you were shot and neither do I. I don't want to be here and go through this any more than any of you want me to but Rossi has started the ball rolling and we need to be as professional as we can be. Guys, you have to help me out here."

Morgan stopped the car. They were at the airfield already. He switched the engine off and turned to face Finn.

"Finn this is difficult for you in ways that we can not even begin to imagine but it's difficult for us too. Trust me, once we're on that plane and we're discussing this case, we'll be as professional as we need to be. But you have to remember that you are part of our family and we're hurting for you."

Finn closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She hadn't felt like she was one of the team until this moment. It was a horrible way to find out that the people she worked with cared for her so much.

Morgan held back as Garcia and Prentiss followed Finn onto the plane. Reid trudged behind them, carrying Garcia's laptop and other equipment she had hastily thrown into her bag when Hotch told her she was coming with them. Morgan figured that Garcia was only there because she was the closest to Finn and Hotch figured she'd need a friend close by.

Hotch pulled the second SUV to a halt and climbed out with Rossi following him. Morgan made straight for Rossi. Hotch immediately got himself between Rossi and Morgan, anticipating the trouble that was to follow. Hotch had seen how Morgan had responded to Rossi when they'd been investigating who had shot Garcia and wasn't about to take any chances.

"Derek, this is neither the time nor the place. We have a job to do and we need to do it quickly. This isn't just about Finn any more; this is about the other girls this unsub has done this to and stopping him from doing it to anyone else. Anything you feel the need to say to Agent Rossi can wait until we have solved this case."

Rossi, to his credit, came out from behind Hotch and stood in front of Morgan.

"If there is something you need to say to me Derek, I suggest you get it out of the way now." Rossi pulled himself up to his full height and faced Morgan square on. "When we get on that plane we need to have our business heads on and to leave our personal feelings behind."

"Leave our personal feelings behind? Really? Is that because you don't have any feelings Rossi? I know you're not the best team player in the world but you need to know that what you did to Finn is unacceptable." Morgan was in Rossi's face but Rossi didn't flinch.

"I have feelings Derek. I feel for Finn, I really do but I stand by my decision. There is a serial killer out there and we need Finn to help us find him. We have a job to do. Any feelings, personal or otherwise, can be dealt with once our investigation is over."

"You really are..."

"Derek, please stop." Finn was behind Derek, pulling him away from Rossi. "Hotch, will you and Rossi please get on the plane?"

Both men walked away without looking back.

"Derek, I know that you're trying to be helpful and stick up for me and I appreciate it, I really do. But please, please will you just stop being such a man." Finn spat the last word out like it was some kind of a disease. "What's done is done and no amount of your posturing will change that. When PG asked you to stop treating her like a victim you complied didn't you? You didn't agree with Rossi's methods then and you don't agree with them now but you are making this so much harder than it needs to be. Please, for my sake, will you just drop it and go back to being your usual tough guy self? What I need right now is some sense of normality."

"Finn, I'm sorry. I was trying to be your knight in shining armour."

"And you are," Finn reached up and hugged Derek. "you are every girls night in shining armour and a very buff one at that."

"You sure you're going to be OK?"

"Of course I am. I'm a FBI agent. I am tougher than wood."

Morgan laughed and put his arm around Finn's shoulder as they walked towards the plane. Finn hesitated at the foot of the stairs as she watched Morgan's ass make its way up them. She took a deep breath and hoped that she could start to be believe what she had just said in the time it took her to ascend the stairs.


	8. Chapter 8

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Eight

Rossi watched Finn tense when they walked into Reno PD. She had been extremely quiet on the plane journey and had spent a fair amount of it sleeping. None of them had the heart to wake her; they all knew what she would be going through until they caught the unsub. Rossi had felt everyone looking at him since they got on the plane and, if it wasn't for the fact that he thought he'd already done enough damage, he would have called them on it. Instead he sat quietly and bit his tongue.

They were met by Detective Saunders and ushered into the incident room. The images that Rossi had shared with the team were already displayed along with all relevant information. Garcia immediately closed her eyes and inched her way around the table by touch alone. Morgan helped her until she was sat safely with her back to the images. Hotch took over the talking and started briefing Detective Saunders but he, and everyone else, were watching Finn.

"Finn, do you need a minute?" Emily whispered in her ear.

"No," said Finn as she straightened her shoulders and held her head high. "I'm fine."

Detective Saunders looked inquisitively at Hotch but Hotch just shook his head and carried on talking. Detective Saunders interrupted him.

"I'm sorry. I don't know what's going on here but is there something you would like to share?"

"No detective, there isn't."

Finn walked over to the board and started examining the photos on there.

"Are you sure cos your agent over there sure doesn't look right to me."

"Detective do I have to remind you..."

"It's fine Hotch. He needs to know."

Finn took two of the pictures off the board and handed them to detective Saunders.

"These two pictures, and the rest that were with them, are of me. The scars you see are the scars that are on my stomach and the unsub we are chasing is the one who did it to me."

"OK Agent Hotchner, I think we really need to have a talk now. I am not willing to put my men at risk with an agent who is so involved in this case."

"Detective Saunders, we are all involved in this case. Agent Beckett is part of our team and our friend; that means that we all have personal interests in this case. And if you think that any of us are going anywhere without doing our job then you are sorely mistaken. Now if you don't mind, please can we get on with the case?"

Detective Saunders backed down and walked away. Finn sat in one of the chairs around the table and let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. Hotch had just broken one of the fundamental rules; don't piss off the police department and he'd done it protecting her. She felt like crying and smiling at the same time. Instead she took a drink from the bottle of water Emily had brought her and looked at the faces of her friends.

"So what do we do now?" she asked.

Hotch reeled off orders and everything started moving; everyone left with orders apart from Finn.

"Hotch, what do you want me to do?"

"Finn, you're not going to like this but I want you to stay here." Finn opened her mouth to protest but Hotch held up his hand to silence her. "I know you came here wanting in on the action but I can't let you out there. You're too involved in this and you can't see it clearly enough. You will be more of a liability than anything else."

"You want me to stay here and do what? Knit? I need to be out there Hotch. I need to be involved in this."

"And you will be. I want you and Reid to work on locations and similarities between the victims. And you can help Garcia too."

Finn slumped into the chair dejected but knowing that Hotch was right. Reid took the pictures from Finn and squeezed her shoulder.

"You know, if you want to do some knitting, I could do with a new scarf."

Finn looked up at him, ready to tear a strip off him but the smile on his face and the twinkle in his eye made her laugh out loud for the first time in a long while.

Whether it was because he was still mad at Rossi or just because he had a mean streak, Hotch had teamed Rossi up with Morgan. They were on their way to where the last body was found and the temperature inside the SUV was freezing. Eventually Rossi could stand it no more.

"Look will you just say to me what you want to say and get it over with? At least that way we might be able to get on with this investigation without the stares and without me having to watch my back from my team."

"You know that's your damn problem right there Rossi. You think the whole world revolves around you. You think that you are the most important person there is and you have no regard for other people's feelings. Finn isn't here because she wants to be. She's here because you made her feel like she needed to be; because you made her feel like she needed to be strong enough to face this head on. And don't you think you might be making things worse for her? There's a reason she never told any of us this and you know it's more than the confidentiality of it. Which is another thing; how the hell did you manage to find out all that information? Finn's original file was classified and then you managed to find all the other stuff."

"I called in a favour or two."

"Strauss? I've always thought she had a soft spot for you but I never thought she'd pull something like this."

"Look Morgan I get that you're mad at me and I get that you feel you need to protect Finn but the truth of the matter is that this needs to be investigated. If I hadn't have turned up any more information when I looked I wouldn't have thought we needed to look into this case but the fact that I found more victims with the same wounds tells me that we needed to do this. You don't have to agree with my methods but you have to agree that we have a job to do no matter how hard it is for us or the people we care about."

"I'm not even sure you care about any of us Rossi, not any more."

Rossi didn't know what to say to that and Morgan seemed happy that he had won the argument.

"Is working with me going to cause a problem Morgan?"

Morgan looked at Rossi out of the corner of his eye.

"Not now, but maybe when we catch this motherfucker."

Everyone regrouped in the incident room and went through the information they had found. It wasn't much. Finn had been alternately helping Reid and getting in his way to helping out Garcia and getting in her way too. The problem was that Finn didn't cope well cooped up inside and she needed to be out in the field. She understood that Hotch didn't want anything or anyone compromised by her but it was so difficult to sit here and feel like she wasn't doing anything.

"Finn. Finn. You OK?"

Finn raised her head and realised that everyone was looking at her.

"Yeah sorry. I'm fine."

"Look guys, it's late and we're all tired and hungry. I say we get some food and some rest and come at this in the morning."

"What? No." Finn stood and slammed her hand on the table. "We're seriously going to give up on this tonight and sleep? There's still so much more we can do."

"Finn, you know as well as I do that nothing is gained from working on something so hard that you burn out. We all need clear heads to catch this unsub and food and sleep will give us that."

Hotch squeezed Finn's shoulder and pulled her to one side.

"Finn I know you want to get this fixed as soon as you can but right now I need you to calm down and go and get some food and rest. I promise you that if we hear anything new I will tell you myself."

"I need to be there Hotch. I need to be there when he's arrested."

"I know and I promise you can be there as long as you do what I say now."

Finn turned down everyone's request of having a drink and something to eat in the hotel bar and headed straight up to her room. Garcia had told her she was going to order room service for her whether she liked it or not and that she intended to make sure that she'd eaten it before she went to bed.

Finn walked into the hotel bedroom and threw her go-bag down on the double bed. What she really wanted to do was to curl up under the duvet and never move but she knew that wasn't a possibility. If she did that there was a chance she'd never get up and anyway, every time she closed her eyes she relived what had happened and that pissed her off. She'd spent a long time trying to bury those memories and now they were back. She opened her go-bag and pulled out her toiletries. She wanted a shower; a scolding hot shower to try and scrub away the feeling of dirtiness that had been enveloping her all day.

The knocking on the door started when she was lathering her hair. Finn ignored it figuring that it was the food Garcia had threatened to send to her room. Sooner or later they'd get bored and leave it outside the door. But the knocking didn't stop and eventually Finn turned off the shower and threw a towel around herself. She was about to walk to the door and tear the intruder a new one when a voice on the other side of the door made her stop dead.

"Finn? Finn? I know you're in there. Will you just let me in?"

Finn leant on the door and let out an exasperated sigh.

"Rossi, you are the last person I want to speak to at the moment. Please can you just go and leave me alone?"

"Finn the last thing you need is to be alone right now. If you don't let me in I'm going to go and get Garcia."

Finn could just imagine what Garcia would be like when Rossi got finished embellishing how bad it would be for Finn to be on her own right now. As much as Finn loved Garcia she couldn't do with her smothering right now. Reluctantly Finn opened the door and let Rossi in.

"You were in the shower?"

"No Rossi, I always answer the door dripping wet and wearing a towel."

Rossi had the good grace to avert his eyes as he walked past Finn and into her room. He sat on the chair by the window and crossed one leg over the other.

"What?" he asked.

"Are you just going to sit there?"

"Well I surmised that you would want to get finished showering and then we can talk."

Finn walked into the bathroom and slammed the door shut. Talking, yeah that was just what she needed. If Rossi thought that he was going to get anything out of her tonight then he was sorely mistaken. She was going to make it as uncomfortable for him as this was for her.


	9. Chapter 9

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Nine

Finn stood in front of the bathroom mirror and wiped the steam from its surface. The face that looked back at her was grimacing; her cheeks were flushed and her very wet hair was stuck to her head in clumps. That damn man was determined to rake her over hot coals whether she liked it or not. As if he hadn't done enough damage already.

When Finn appeared from the bathroom wearing a fluffy bathrobe with her hair wrapped in a turban Rossi was astounded at how young and tired she looked. The bags under her eyes indicated that she hadn't had much sleep over the past couple of days but the steely gaze she fixed him with was no different to the one she'd always used. Rossi watched as Finn arranged herself on the bed. She tucked her legs underneath her and put one of the pillows on her knee.

"Hiding from everyone isn't going to help you in the long run." Rossi leant towards Finn and rested his hands on his knee.

"Evidently as they appear to let themselves into my room whilst I'm in the shower."

"You were supposed to be in your room, you weren't answering your cell phone and you weren't opening your door. What was I supposed to do?"

"Well you could have got the message that I wanted to be alone and left me alone."

"The last thing I think you need to be at the moment is alone."

"And you think that I want to be with you? If it wasn't for you everyone I work with would still be blissfully unaware of any of this and wouldn't be looking at me like they are."

"They're looking at you like that because they are your friends and they want to help you."

"No, they're looking at me like that because they pity me and they're wondering why I didn't share this information with them sooner. We haven't been working together long enough to be considered friends."

"When you spend as long together as we do, doing what we do then you become friends quicker than you realise."

"So why were you so unfriendly when I first started?"

"Look, I was wrong and I apologise. I was wary of you because your file is so empty and we knew nothing about you. The order for you to join us came from higher than Strauss. It looked to us like you were being planted to help break up the team."

"To us? You mean to you? You were the only one who had a problem with me. You were the only one who was horrible to me and undermined me at every turn and you're the reason why I'm sat in this hotel room."

Finn climbed off the bed and headed for the mini bar. she was pouring herself a large vodka when she felt Rossi standing behind her. He reached around and took the glass from the table before Finn could protest.

"Hey. What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Finn stood and watched Rossi as he stalked towards the bathroom with the glass in his hand.

"You don't need to get drunk Finn. You need a clear head for the morning."

"I'll only have a clear head if I can get some sleep and I won't be able to get some sleep without something to help me." Finn whined.

Rossi completely ignored Finn's protestations and chucked the drink down the sink. When he came back into the bedroom Finn was once again sat on the bed clutching the pillow to her chest. Rossi decided to chance sitting on the edge of the bed. He was relieved that Finn didn't push him away or move herself.

"What do you want Rossi?" Finn asked. She sounded exhausted and as if all the drive had suddenly disappeared out of her.

"I just want you to be alright. And I want to stop fighting with you all the time. And I want you to know that I'm sorry you have to go through all of this. I stand by my decision that it was the right thing to do, I just wish it could have been done in a different way."

"I know." Finn whispered. "I know that this was the right thing to do Rossi just like I know that I have to be here with you all but that doesn't stop it from being extremely difficult. I tried so hard to put all of this behind me and yet here it is being raked up again."

Rossi reached over and took Finn's hand, relieved when she didn't immediately snatch it back.

"Sweetheart, I can't even begin to imagine how what has happened to you has affected you but you need to know that we're all here for you no matter what."

"You know, I didn't even get to go to Dan's funeral."

"You're partner?"

"Yeah. I was in hospital when the funeral happened but I was politely asked to stay away by his relatives in case I had any idea of breaking out. Not that I could have done that anyway but they blamed me entirely. They thought that Dan had been killed because of me; because he stood in the way of the unsub getting to me. And then, when I was in a fit state to begin to mourn him, they moved me to New York for a full de-briefing and new start."

"It wasn't your fault. There was nothing you could do to stop the unsub. You did everything you were supposed to do. You reported his interest to your superiors and the sweep came back clean. You thought you had nothing to fear from him when he approached you in the bar that second time."

"All I can think of is that I should have noticed something. There should have been something in his personality that told me he was a psycho. I studied criminal behaviour; I came top of my class but he still managed to pull the wool over my eyes and it cost Dan his life. No matter what happens I'll never forgive myself for that."

"You have to forgive yourself Finn because if you don't it's going to eat you up inside for the rest of you life."

Finn shuffled down the bed until she was laid on her back.

"They warn you when you spend so long undercover that you need to find a way to hold on to your identity; to not forget who you are, where you came from. What they don't tell you is how to do that. Over seven years I did 3 long-term assignments. The shortest one was over 18 months long and for that time I lived, breathed, ate and slept as a different person. The only time I remembered I wasn't that person was when I met my handler. A lot of the time it was coded communication, hardly any of it was verbal. The only person I had significant contact with who knew the real me was Dan. We knew each other inside and out. That's why we worked so well together. And all it took was one short moment, one chance meeting to stop all that."

Finn wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her dressing gown. Rossi thought about getting her some tissues but he didn't want to move, to disturb her in any way. He had the feeling she'd been wanting to say this for a long time but had never had the chance. There was no way he was going to jeopardise that now.

"I remember most of the that night. Hell I remember most of the whole horrible experience. That's part of the problem. I never told anyone though. They would make me re-live it again and again and I wasn't ready for that. I remember the journey home. The car was one of the few places we could just be ourselves; when we were alone anyways. We were laughing and joking like always. When we got back to the house the alarm was still on, nothing had been disturbed. The house still looked like it always had done. I didn't think twice about sending Dan to put the trash out."

Finn took a deep breath to try and steady her nerves. She had no idea why she was telling this to Rossi. He was the reason she was thinking about it at all. But then again, maybe she wanted him to realise exactly what this was doing to her. Finn closed her eyes and carried on.

"I knew in my gut that something wasn't right when I went to check on him yet the thought of picking up my gun never entered my mind. The thought of getting something that could protect us wasn't there. I forgot all my training because I was comfortable with the situation, because I was comfortable with Dan. I keep asking myself if I would have been able to save him if I had just grabbed my gun and the answer I always come to is yes, I could have saved him."

"Finn there was nothing you could do. The unsub had already targeted you regardless of what you did or didn't do that night. And from what you told me, and from what I read in the reports, he blind-sided you. You didn't see it coming and then there was nothing more you could do."

"When I was in the kitchen with the unsub, before my brain kicked into gear and I tried to get my gun, I could still see Dan. He was staring straight at me and there was nothing I could do to save him. I had to make a choice. I had to try and fight for my life or die mourning Dan."

"You chose to live. I doubt there would be anyone in the world who could fault you for wanting to live. You're a smart woman Finn. You know there's no shame in fighting for your life even if you couldn't save someone important to you."

"Knowing that really doesn't help. It doesn't stop me from still seeing his face when I try to sleep or having conversations with him in my dreams. When I was in that room, chained to that bed, all I could think was that I needed to get out of there and find Dan. I tried to keep my hope alive by thinking that someone would have found him and that he would be waiting for me when I escaped or that he'd be going mad and making people's lives a misery until they found me. He could be a real hard-ass when he wanted to be."

Finn laughed at the memory and then started to silently sob. Rossi bent and scooped her up into his arms. Her head fell against his shoulder and he held her as she cried.

Jesus, how long had she been holding this in, thought Rossi. It's been over two years since this happened and she hadn't told anyone how she felt or what she remembered. And now, because of him and his total insensitivity, she was having to think about it again. For the first time since he had started on this path Rossi wondered if he'd made the right decision. He could have told Finn what he was planning to do but leave her out of the investigation; leave her back with Garcia to look at trolls and fluffy pens. But then Finn had said it herself, she'd lived with this for too long and needed to put it to bed one way or another. Rossi doubted that she could have stayed away from this investigation. She required closure and he was damn sure she was going to get it if it was the last thing he did.

"I'm sorry." said Finn as she pulled away. "That was probably the last thing you needed tonight."

"Finn, don't ever apologise for talking to me. You can always talk to me. But sweetheart, right now I think you need some sleep."

"Yeah well I can try."

Finn climbed off the bed and went into the bathroom. Rossi heard the tap turn on then a few moments later Finn walked out. She had changed into pyjamas and her hair was tied up in a low ponytail. Rossi stood from his position on the bed and pulled the covers back.

"In you go."

"God it's like being a kid again. Are you going to tuck me in and read me a bedtime story too?"

"Not tonight kiddo. You need some sleep."

Finn snuggled under the covers and got herself comfortable. Once she seemed settled Rossi squeezed her hand and walked towards the door.

"Rossi."

"Sweetheart."

"Will you stay? I mean you don't have to. You can say no if you don't want to..."

"Of course I'll stay."

Rossi walked over to the chair and tried to get himself comfortable but it was obvious he was going to be in for a bad nights' sleep.

"Rossi, seriously, come over here. I mean you'll have to stay on the top of the covers obviously but you're not going to get any sleep over there."

Rossi realised she was right but was still reluctant to share a bed with her; on top of the covers or not. He looked at Finn watching him and decided that if that's what she wanted that's what she was going to get. He lay on the bed next to Finn, being overly careful not to touch her in any way. Finn however wasn't so careful. She rolled onto her side and snuggled into him, throwing her arm across his shoulder. There was nothing Rossi could do but to cuddle into Finn too otherwise he'd be having just as uncomfortable night sleep as he would have if he'd stayed in the chair. He slipped his arm under Finn's head and pulled her closer to him.

"Thank you David."

Rossi inhaled sharply. She'd only ever used his christian name once before and that had exactly the same affect on him as it was having now. Instinctively Rossi kissed her head.

"You're welcome sweetheart."


	10. Chapter 10

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Ten

Rossi woke up the next morning as the sun came through the sides of the curtains. Finn had rolled onto her side in the night and obviously followed suit and he was spooned behind her with his arm over her waist. He pulled himself up so he was propped on his elbow and looked down at Finn's sleeping form. She looked more peaceful than she had done the previous night and he was glad for that. She moved her head, making her fringe fall over her face. Before he could stop himself Rossi had pushed her hair back behind her ear and kissed her lightly on the forehead. He stopped himself, wondering where that gesture had come from. Finn stirred and opened her eyes, looking up at him.

"Morning." Finn rubbed her eyes as she tried to wake up.

"Morning sleepyhead."

Rossi climbed off the bed and ran his fingers through his short hair which was stuck up in all different directions.

"What time is it?" Finn asked. She had sat up in bed and was also running her fingers through her hair.

"Just after six. You should probably try to get some more sleep and come in later. You're going to need the rest."

"No. I'm good. I just need a shower and some coffee and I'll be ready to go."

Rossi saw no need to argue. Finn's face was determined and he didn't want to undo any of the progress he had started to make last night.

"Ok, I'll meet you downstairs on thirty minutes. We can pick up coffee on the way in."

Rossi left the room half expecting Finn to call him back as she had done the previous night. When he got through the door without her stopping him he felt slightly disappointed. Of course she didn't want him there while she was showering. He sensed they'd made a small amount of progress the previous night but the friendship was far from being saved. He headed straight to his room to shower and change. He wasn't sure that her being so involved in the investigation was a good idea but Hotch had agreed to it so there wasn't a great deal he could do about it.

"Oh dude, please tell me that I just did not see you coming out of Finn's room still wearing last night's clothes."

Rossi stopped short and spun around only to come face to face with Morgan.

"Derek, no matter what you think, this isn't it."

"So you're coming out of her room wearing last night's clothes and you expect me to believe that nothing went on last night? With your reputation?"

"Yes with my reputation. Derek that woman in there is hurting more than you or I can even begin to comprehend. What she needed last night was the exact thing I gave her."

"Oh yeah and what exactly was that?"

"A shoulder to cry on. Someone to listen to what was on her mind. Someone she could talk to so she could get the first decent night's sleep she's had in ages. I have no idea what kind of a guy you think I am but I wouldn't stoop so low as to take advantage of her. Now, if you don't mind I have to get showered and changed."

Rossi stalked off leaving Morgan stood in the corridor.

"Is that Rossi?" asked Prentiss as she came up behind Morgan.

"Yeah." growled Morgan.

"Did he just come out of Finn's room?" asked Reid who had been following Prentiss.

"Yeah."

"Has he done anything we need to kill him for?" said Prentiss.

"Yeah cos I know the perfect place to bury a body." Joked Reid.

"He says not but I don't know."

"Do you really think he'd take advantage of her like this?" Prentiss followed Morgan as he stormed down the corridor. Morgan stopped in front of the elevator and pounded the button. "Morgan?"

"No, I don't think he would but seriously Prentiss, if she needed someone to talk to why didn't she choose one of us? Why not Garcia? Why would she choose him?"

"Well, maybe she wanted someone who wouldn't be as personally involved as one of us. Or maybe, Rossi was in the right place at the right time." Reid lent against the wall picking at the stitching on his satchel.

"Yeah well, where Finn is concerned I don't trust him at all." Morgan stomped into the elevator. Prentiss smiled at Reid and followed him in.

Finn watched Rossi leave the room and lay back on the bed. She stretched her arms above her head and tried to drain some of the tension from her muscles. When it didn't work she decided she'd try a scolding hot shower instead.

Standing under the searingly hot water Finn tried to decide whether or not she could stomach seeing this investigation through to its conclusion. Last night had almost been as difficult as telling the team what had happened to her. She had always hoped she'd be able to forge some kind of relationship with Rossi but now all she saw when she looked into his face was worse than seeing it on everyone else's faces. As Finn towelled herself off she resolved that if anyone could solve this case and stop it from happening again it was her team; her friends.

True to his word Rossi stopped off for coffee on the way to the police department. He climbed out of the car and walked into the coffee shop without asking her what she wanted. Finn rested her head on the headrest and closed her eyes. The shower had momentarily woken her up but now she was starting to feel sleepy. She needed some adrenalin coursing through her system but right now she'd settle for coffee.

Finn jumped as Rossi opened the car door and climbed back in. in his hands he had four drinks.

"Expecting company?" Finn asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Nope. Smoothie because I know you didn't have breakfast this morning and; and believe me the thought of this drink is disgusting; one caramel macchiato, half-fat milk, extra shot and extra caramel sauce. Average sugar content is off the scale."

"Mmmm perfect." Finn took a long drink of the coffee.

"No you don't." Rossi took the drink from Finn's hand. "Smoothie first, then coffee. Mo one need you high on caffeine and sugar."

"Yes Dad." Mumbled Finn under her breath.

"Less of the sarcasm thanks."

Finn's response was drowned out by the noise of Rossi's cell phone.

"Rossi."

"Dave, it's Aaron. Don't put me on speaker, just listen."

"Ok."

"The unsub knows that Finn's here and he remembers her."

"What? How…." Hotch cut him off before he could say anything else.

"A young girl came into Reno PD first thing this morning to hand deliver a package for Finn. Morgan intercepted it and opened it. Its pictures of Finn yesterday. Our best guess is they are from when she was on her way back to the hotel last night. And there was a message with it."

"What do you want me to do?"

"Finn won't appreciate being kept in the dark about this and we need you here with us working the case. We're going to have to tell her when you bring her in and deal with the fallout. We'll have to keep her at the police department for her own safety."

"Ok. We're about ten minutes away."

Rossi put his phone back in his pocket and started the car without saying a word.

"Well?" asked Finn. "What's up?"

"Hotch wanted to know where we are."

"And the rest of the conversation?"

"We've got a new lead."

By the time they got to the police department, Finn was all but ready to kill Rossi. He refused to tell her what Hotch had said to him on the phone and she was beginning to lose her patience.

"Rossi damn it, will you just tell me what the hell…."

Finn's sentence was cut short when she saw the faces of the rest of her team. Every single one of them looked like someone had died.

"What?" asked Finn. "Oh you know this is starting to piss me off. What the hell is going on?"

Hotch stepped forward and tried to direct Finn to a seat. She shrugged him off angrily.

"Will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?"

Hotch gave Finn the folder he had been holding.

"These photos were dropped off here. They appear to be of you last night."

"Oh my God."

Finn let Hotch direct her to a chair. She threw the pictures on the table and crossed her arms over her chest.

"We got this as well." Hotch slid a piece of paper across the table. Finn didn't pick it up but read it where it was.

_You can change the colour of your hair_

_ You can even change the clothes you wear_

_ But the one thing you cannot change_

_ Oh FBI victim of mine_

_ Are the scars that you bear_

"How does he know I'm here? Dammit Hotch, how does he know?"

"I don't know yet Finn but we will find out."

"He knows who I am Hotch."

Tears streamed down Finn's face. This new information was too much to bear. Hotch held her hand.

"I think I'm going to be sick."

Finn bolted out of the chair and down the corridor to the female bathroom.

"She's right Hotch. How does he know she's here? There was no press coverage when it happened. Her identity was never revealed."

"I know but somehow he knows now and this just puts Finn in more danger than before." Hotch turned to Detective Saunders. "Detective, we're going to need to keep Agent Beckett safe until we catch this unsub. Can you let your people know she is not to leave the station? Garcia will be watching over her until we get this sorted."

"I'll spread the word sir but what do you want us to do if she tried to leave?"

"Just make sure it doesn't get to that point ok?"

"So what do we do now?" asked Prentiss. "We have information but that's not helped us so far."

"We do what we always do. We'll start from the beginning again. There has to be something we've missed."

When Finn came out of the stall the last person she expected to see was Rossi.

"You do know that this is the women's bathroom don't you?" she asked.

"I did wonder why it smelt so nice in here!"

Finn rinsed her mouth and washed her hands. She leant against the row of sinks and looked in the mirror. Rossi came up behind her and rubbed her back.

"We will catch him Finn. I promise you that."

"I know but that isn't making this any easier."

"You will get through this. You are strong enough."

"You have more confidence in that than I do."

"That's because I'm brilliant. You know that."

Rossi smiled and bumped Finn's hip with his. Finn couldn't help herself and smiled back.

"That's my girl."

Even in these dire circumstances, that phrase sent shivers down Finn's spine.


	11. Chapter 11

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

**Thank you for carrying on reading this story. I promise there will be more Rossi and Finn action in later chapters but we need to get there first! Also, this chapter may be a bit sketchy on the technical details but they're not my forte.**

Chapter Eleven

Finn had fallen asleep on the sofa in the incident room where Reid was frantically trying to finish his geographical profile. Hotch hadn't let her go into the field with them and had instructed both Reid and Garcia to make sure Finn didn't move or go anywhere unaccompanied. With nothing else to do but start at the information board she had curled up on the sofa watching Reid work. His constant mutterings had eventually lulled her to sleep. She hadn't woken when he ran from the room, phone in hand to tell the others that he knew where the unsub would be. Hotch told Reid to stay where he was and to keep Finn there too. He would call if Reid was needed. Reid crept back into the incident room and watched over Finn. He'd covered her with a blanket earlier and she'd scrunched it around herself like a shield.

"Reid, they've found him." Garcia burst into the incident room, bracelets jangling around her wrists.

Reid looked up in time to see half the Reno police force filing out of the station.

"Hotch wants you over there with the rest of the team. I'll watch over her." Reid hesitated. "Go my boy genius. Go be wonderful for Finn."

Reid ran out of the room, grateful not only for the chance to escape the burden of watching Finn but also the chance to drive himself to the scene. Being a notoriously bad driver the rest of the team normally kept the car keys far away from him.

Garcia watched Reid leave then pulled a chair over to the sofa. She sat down and gently shook Finn's shoulder. She had to tell her what they'd found but she wasn't looking forward to the task.

"Sweetie. Finn. Wake up."

Finn stirred and rubbed her eyes. She blinked up at Garcia, trying to find her bearings.

"PG? what's going on? Where's Reid?"

"He's gone to meet the rest of the team. Finn, they've found him. The team is over there now."

"What the hell?" Finn sat upright. "Where are they?"

Finn pulled her gun from her bag and stood to strap it to her waistband. She was scrabbling around trying to get the straps of her bullet proof vest undone.

"Sweetie, you can't go." Garcia held Finn by her shoulders to stop her from moving. "Hotch doesn't want you there."

"What? I have to be there?"

"I know sweetie, I know but when the unit chief gives you an order you do it. I know it's hard but you have to stay here. I'll be with you. We'll get through this."

"Garcia, I love you dearly but you have to move out of the way. I don't want to have to shoot you but I will if you don't move out of my way."

"No." Garcia stood her ground even though she was beginning to shake with fear. "I can't do that Finn."

"PG please. Don't make me beg you. Don't make me lose what little credibility I have left by making me beg."

"Ok." Garcia was going to feel the wrath of Hotch for this but there wasn't much she could do. "But I'm going with you."

Finn didn't question Garcia's decision, just ran out of the incident room, bullet-proof jacket in hand with Garcia frantically following behind.

"There's no way out for you now." Rossi was talking to the unsub through a loud hailer. "John, if you come out now we'll be able to help you but if you carry on shooting you know this isn't going to end well."

Following Reid's geographical profile the team had tracked the unsub down to a small desolate property on the outskirts of town. His name was John Chambers; he was 31, a loner who locals always thought was a little strange. There was no doubt in their minds that he was the unsub they were looking for. Now they were embroiled in a shoot-out which everyone knew would only end one way.

"Bring me Agent Beckett and then we can talk." Shouted John.

"Like hell I'm going to do that." said Hotch quietly to Rossi.

"We need to do something to get him out of that house."

"SWAT are in position. I'm going to tell them to take the shot if they can get it."

"I don't think that's a good idea Hotch. We need to take him alive. Finn needs to see him pay for what he's done."

"I'm not going to risk him taking any of us with him. Either SWAT take the shot or we go in."

"Then I think we should go in."

"Err Hotch. I think you should see this." Morgan tapped Hotch on the shoulder and pointed further up the street.

"Shit." Hotch started running.

Rossi watched as Finn climbed out of the SUV that had just screeched to a halt. Garcia climbed out of the passenger side but didn't move from the cover of the car. Rossi's first instinct was to run to Finn and take her away from all of this but he had a job to do and he would be more help to her if he concentrated on that.

"What the hell is she doing?" Rossi asked Morgan. "Morgan, stop her from coming down here. If the unsub sees her he has nothing left to lose."

Morgan set off running to help Hotch keep Finn back.

"What's going on Mr FBI? You all look awfully busy out there."

The unsub was taunting him. Rossi knew this needed to end now. He beckoned the SWAT commander over.

"We're going in now. Get your men ready."

"Garcia, I gave you express orders to keep Finn out of here." Hotch railed on Garcia. Finn stepped up to him.

"Hotch leave her out of this. She had no choice. This is all down to me, not PG."

"And you should know better Agent Beckett. Right now there are two agents here with us who should be diffusing the situation down there."

"You didn't seriously expect me to stay away did you? You know I can't."

"I expect you to follow order Agent Beckett. Now either you get back in that car or I will discipline you as much as I can."

Finn noticed the SWAT team moving into position.

"What's going on? What are they doing?"

"Rossi told them to get ready to storm the building." Morgan said as he arrived.

"No." shouted Finn. "They can't do that. They'll shoot him. Hotch you have to stop them."

"I can't do that Finn. We have to get the situation under control."

Finn watched as Rossi led the SWAT team towards the front door of the house.

"No Rossi, please don't." Finn whispered as she struggled to get past Hotch.

"Morgan, get yourself down there."

Morgan set off at a run towards the house. He was ten yards away when the first shot rang out. There was a barrage of gunfire then nothing.

"No." Finn screamed. She strained against Hotch's restraining arms. Garcia was still stood in the same spot completely unable to move. "Let me go dammit."

Hotch didn't say a word. He just kept a tight hold on Finn. They watched as Rossi came out of the house, head hung low. Reid and Prentiss followed him. Rossi said something to them both and make his way over to Finn. Finn broke free of Hotch's grip and ran towards him.

"What did you do? What the hell did you do?" Finn screamed into Rossi's face. She barrelled his chest with her fists. Rossi caught them easily and looked Finn straight in the eye.

"He's dead bella. I shot him."

"No," said Finn, shaking her head. "Tell me you didn't Rossi."

"I'm sorry bella."

Finn was sobbing now, tears coursing down her face.

"But I needed to know why." She said before she collapsed to the floor. Rossi followed her down. He didn't want to let go of her.

"I know. I'm sorry bella." He whispered into her hair as they rocked backward and forward on the floor. "I am so so sorry bella."


	12. Chapter 12

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Twelve

The team went back to Reno PD to collect their things before flying home. The atmosphere was subdued. Finn hadn't said a word on the drive back and now she was sat at the table as the rest of the team packed up around her. Every now and then someone would reach down and squeeze her shoulder or offer to get her a cup of coffee. Each time she smiled politely and shook her head. Eventually she stood and walked over to Hotch.

"Hotch, I just wanted to apologise for my behaviour earlier. It was unprofessional and could have put the team at risk."

"Finn, I understand what you needed to do but I needed you to follow my orders. But I thank you for apologising. We'll discuss it further when we get back to the BAU."

"About that. There's something I'd like to do first if that's ok?"

"Of course. We'll meet you at the plane."

Finn walked into the city morgue and flashed her ID to the assistant on duty. He looked slightly taken aback to be getting a visit from the FBI.

"Ma'am, how can I help you?"

"A body was brought in earlier today, John Chambers. I'd like to see the body please."

"Yes certainly ma'am." Said the assistant as he flicked through a book in front of him. "If you'd like to follow me."

Finn followed the morgue assistant down a dimly lit corridor into a sterile white room. The walls were lined with what looked like lockers. Finn knew what would be in each of them and it made her shudder. The assistant pulled the table out and started to pull back the sheet covering the body.

"It's ok, I can take it from here." Finn said, rather more forcefully than she intended. She ended her sentence with a smile, hoping to make up for the stern-ness of her words.

"Of course ma'am." The assistant more or less backed out of the room bowing to her.

Finn waited until she heard the door thud shut before she let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. Steeling herself for whatever reaction she was going to have she pulled back the cover and stared at the face of her torturer.

Finn didn't know what she would feel but she didn't expect it to be nothing absolutely nothing. There was no disgust, no revulsion, no fear, no sadness and no elation that he was dead. Since the investigation had started she had silently formulated questions she wanted answering. No not wanted; needed. She was sure that she'd need answers to gain the closure she needed. She needed to know why he picked her; what had she done to appeal to him because it was her he had picked, not Dan. Dan had been an unfortunate casualty of one man's psychosis. More than anything, Finn wanted to know that there was nothing she could have done to save Dan: she wanted her absolution. And Rossi had taken that away when he shot him.

Finn knew that she was being unrealistic and unfair when she blamed Rossi but it was the only raw emotion she could hold on to. Right now she needed someone to blame. From all accounts Rossi had no choice. John Chambers had obviously decided on suicide by cop and aimed his gun directly at Rossi. Rossi had done the exact same thing Finn would have if she'd been in his position.

Finn heard the door open behind her and she knew at once that it wasn't the morgue assistant. Rossi said nothing as he stood next to Finn. Neither of them spoke for a while.

"You shot him." It wasn't a question for Rossi; it was a statement of fact.

"I had no choice Finn. " Rossi said quietly. The sight of Finn crumpled on the floor I his arms would haunt him for a long time to come.

"I needed to check that he was really dead. I had to be sure. I expected to feel…to feel something."

"And what do you feel?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I don't know if it's shock or something. I don't know if it'll hit me later but right now, I feel absolutely nothing."

Finn covered the body with the sheet again and turned to face Rossi. He took both of her hands in his and pulled them towards his chest. He half expected her to resist; to show him that the old, feisty Finn was still there but she made no attempt to stop him.

"Finn I want you to promise me that when the time comes and you need someone to talk to about this, you'll call me. I don't care whether it's tonight or six months from now. I just want you to promise me that you'll pick up the phone and call me."

"Feeling guilty?" retorted Finn then immediately looked ashamed. "I'm sorry Rossi. That was uncalled for. I didn't mean it."

"You're right you know. I do feel guilty. I've put you through so much in the past couple of days and I do feel guilty about it. But you're a strong, feisty, independent woman Finn. You will get through this and I'll help you every step of the way."

"I guess I'd better put you on speed dial then." Finn smiled at Rossi.

"See, there's my smiling bella."

Finn snaked her arms around Rossi's neck and pulled him into a hug.

"Thank you Rossi. You gave me closure no one else could."

Rossi opened Finn's front door and held it for her. She walked into the hallway and turned to face him.

"Thanks for the ride Rossi. I'm ok from here."

"Yeah right." He snorted as he pushed past her.

Finn closed the door and followed Rossi down the hall into her kitchen. He already had the fridge door open.

"Do you have any milk?"

"Milk? I don't know. Probably not."

"Ok, I'll add it to the list."

"List? What list Rossi?" Finn slammed her hands down on the work surface. "What the hell are you doing?"

"Well, I was going to make you some hot chocolate to take to be with you but apparently you don't have any milk."

"Ok, there are three things we need to sort out." Rossi turned to face Finn and crossed his arms over his chest. He raised an eyebrow as Finn continued. "First of all I don't like hot chocolate. Second, you need to leave. You're not staying here."

"And what is the third?"

"I don't need you to look after me. I don't need anyone to look after me."

Rossi crossed the kitchen and stood in front of Finn. He put his hands on her shoulders and spoke softly to her.

"OK, bella, here's how it's going to be. Your house is my house; at least for the next few days. I am going to wait on you hand and foot until I am happy that you are doing ok. Until then you are going to accept my help with good grace and lots of smiles. Now bella, you need some sleep, albeit minus the hot chocolate. I will be here when you wake up."

"Rossi, you are not moving in with me whether it's for the next few days of the next few hours. I am a grown woman. I will be absolutely fine on my own."

"Finn, you can say all you want; you can moan all you want but I am staying here until I deem it time for me to leave. So, I suggest you take your scowl to bed and when you wake back up hopefully you'll be in a better mood."

Finn didn't say another word. She could see there was no point. Once Rossi had made his mind up it took a lot to change it. She talked off in the direction of her bedroom and slammed the door.

Rossi made himself comfortable on the sofa and flicked on the TV. He made his way through all the channels once before turning it off and picking up his phone.

"Garcia, have you managed to get everything I asked for?"

"Of course my liege. When do you want it?"

"As soon as you can. She should be asleep by now. I want to get everything sorted by the time she wakes up."

"Understood my Italian stallion. I am on my way."

Rossi threw his phone onto the coffee table and sat back in the chair. He'd just grab 40 winks before Garcia arrived. Unfortunately the 40 winks turned into full on snoring she he awoke with a start when the doorbell rang. He sprang out of the chair and ran to the door, trying not to slip on the wooden floor in his sock covered feet.

"Garcia, jeez couldn't you have rung or something? I don't want to wake her up."

"I'm not sure she's the one I've just woken up."

Rossi's head snapped to the speaker's face and was surprised to find that it was Morgan."

"Wow Garcia you've really let yourself go."

"Funny man, funny. My baby girl needs some rest too you know." Said Morgan as he pushed past Rossi and stomped his way to the kitchen.

"Make a little more noise will you?" muttered Rossi under his breath.

"So you're going to take care of her now are you Rossi?" Morgan leant against the worktop with his arms crossed over his huge chest. If he wanted to use his vast size to intimidate Rossi it was starting to work.

"Look Morgan, if there's one thing I've learnt over the past couple of weeks it's that Finn is a very special woman. To go through all that and turn out as well and as rounded as she has, well it says a lot about her. She deserves everything she wants in life. Hell, she deserves a lot more than me."

"But?"

"But if she'll have me I'm willing to make her as happy as I can do."

"Just so you know the whole team will hunt you down if you do anything to hurt her."

"I wouldn't expect anything less."

"I'll be watching you Rossi."


	13. Chapter 13

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Thirteen

Finn woke up and for a second didn't remember the events of the past few days. Unfortunately that didn't last long. She fell back to earth with a bump. She groaned and rolled over in bed, closing her eyes tightly to stop fresh tears from falling. She refused to cry over her situation anymore. Today was a fresh start and she wasn't going to spoil it.

Slowly as she woke up Finn remembered that she wasn't alone; Rossi was in her house and judging by the delicious smell wafting under her door, he was cooking. Finn hauled herself upright and pulled on her dressing gown. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror and figured that there was no way she could let anyone see her with bed hair and Hello Kitty pyjamas.

Five minutes later Finn came out of her bedroom wearing an altogether more suitable outfit of black leggings and slobby t-shirt with her hair pulled into a low ponytail. She shuffled down the hall in her leopard print furry boot slippers and wandered into the kitchen. Rossi had his back to her stirring something on the stove. Music played softly in the background. Domestic bliss, thought Finn, if only it was for the reason it was. Finn leant against the doorframe and tried to stop herself from staring at his back. Something has clicked in her head on the plane journey back home. She'd slept fitfully on the plane but whenever she woke up she saw Rossi looking at her. On more than one occasion she's felt him pushing her hair back from her face. Her dreams turned from nightmarish images into rather embarrassing ones featuring Rossi, whipped cream and handcuffs. Finn blushed at the memory.

"It's your kitchen. I'm pretty sure you can come in."

Rossi carried a colander full of pasta over to the work top and dumped it into a bowl Finn didn't know she had.

"I know that. I'm just enjoying watching you. I can't remember the last time someone cooked in this kitchen."

"You need to remedy that."

"I can't cook." Laughed Finn. She wandered into the kitchen and leant against the worktop.

"I'll teach you."

"It'd be easier if you just moved in."

Rossi looked up sharply and Finn blushed. She grabbed some cutlery and started to lay to table. Rossi shook his head and picked up a pan of tomato sauce. Finn came back to the worktop and picked up the wine glasses Rossi had taken from the cupboard and carried them to the table.

"Finn will you sit down and let me do this? I'm supposed to be looking after you."

"I'm fine. It's only a couple of wine glasses."

"Sit down and stay sat down. Don't make me bring out the handcuffs!"

Finn sat at the table but that was mainly because she wanted to hide her red face from him. Images of the pair of them playing with handcuffs sprang into her mind. Jesus girl, she thought, you've just been through one of the most traumatic times of your life and now you're drooling over a colleague. Get a grip.

Rossi brought the huge bowl of pasta over to the table and filled a bowl for Finn.

"Eat."

Finn smiled at Rossi as he heaped food into his own bowl. The food smelled gorgeous but Finn's stomach had other ideas. As soon as the first forkful hit her stomach it began to churn. She pushed the pasta around her plate.

"You have to eat something Finn."

"I know but I was hoping I'd get away with just drinking the invisible wine."

"No food; no wine."

"I thought it was 'no befores; no afters'." Rossi looked perplexed. "It's something my dad used to say. It means you can't have dessert if you don't eat your main course."

"Ah, I see. Well you can have dessert if it means you're eating something but no wine."

Rossi stood and cleared away the plates. Finn noticed that his food was almost untouched and felt bad that he wasn't eating because of her.

"I'm sorry Rossi. You went to so much trouble and I haven't eaten any of it."

"Bella, today you can get away with eating nothing. Tomorrow however, is another day. Now, go into the living room, sit down and pick a movie. I'll bring you some dessert in."

"What kind of dessert is it?"

"It's a surprise. Now scram."

Rossi ambled around Finn's kitchen putting dishes in the dishwasher and leftovers in Tupperware boxes. He was slightly worried about how comfortable he felt in Finn's company and in her home but he pushed the thought to the back of his mind.

When he went into the living room with two bowls of Eton mess Finn was curled up on the sofa with her phone in her hands.

"Garcia wants to know how well you're looking after me."

"And what are you going to tell her?" Rossi put the bowl of dessert onto Finn's lap and sat on the other end of the sofa.

"Judging by the huge amount of dessert you've piled into my bowl I'm guessing you're trying to fatten me up."

"No, I'm just trying to make sure you eat something."

"Well this looks brilliant."

"So what are you going to tell Garcia?"

"That you're doing a very good job of looking after me and that the next time I see her I'm going to be about five stone heavier."

Finn smiled and Rossi laughed. He felt like she was relaxing and he was glad. She needed some fun. Finn put her phone down and started to eat her dessert. They lapsed into a companionable silence as they both ate. Rossi put his empty bowl on the coffee table and picked up the DVD Finn had put to one side.

"Seriously? This is your choice of movie for tonight?"

"What?" Finn said through a mouthful of food.

Rossi read the back of the DVD case, shaking his head.

"How can you watch this kind of stuff when you're surrounded by it all day?"

"Because I know that this isn't real; it's make-believe horror. Besides this job de-sensitises you to everything."

"You need to watch that de-sensitisation. It can lead to problems."

"Please no speeches or work tonight. Let's just watch some blood, guts and gore."

"Has anyone ever told you that you are strange?"

"Oh David, you are not the first and I'm sure you will not be the last."

Rossi tried to ignore the fluttering in his stomach that came every time she called him David. Finn shifted her legs on the sofa as Rossi got up to put the DVD in the player. When he sat back on the sofa Finn unconsciously stretched her legs out so they were on his knee.

"Oh shit. Sorry. I forgot where I was for a second."

"Hey bella, don't sweat it. Here, put your legs back."

Before Finn could protest Rossi pulled her legs back onto his knee. Finn settled down on the sofa with her head on a cushion. Ten minutes into the movie Rossi glanced over at Finn and realised she was fast asleep. He pulled the throw from the back of the sofa and tucked it around her. He leant his head back and closed his eyes. After the past couple of days he needed his own bed and lots of sleep. Instead he was trying to capture a few hours' sleep on a quite uncomfortable sofa and look after Finn as well as he could do. But if Rossi was entirely honest with himself, he'd tell himself that he felt that being here with Finn like this felt right and like it was meant to be. That was going to throw up a whole host of trouble later on.


	14. Chapter 14

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Fourteen

Finn woke up the next morning with a sore neck and a thumping headache. As she came round she realised a number of things: she wasn't in bed, she was starving, she was freezing and she wasn't alone. Rossi was still here, not that she expected him to leave any time soon. He was snoring gently with his head back and his mouth slightly open. Finn lay still for a while and listened to his breathing and hoping that she could fall back asleep but the rumbling from her stomach finally spurred her into action. Trying not to wake him, Finn slowly moved her legs from his lap and say up. She stood, still taking exaggerated care and re-arranged the blanket that had been over her, over Rossi. He stirred slightly as she tucked him in but didn't wake.

Finn looked at Rossi properly, quite possibly for the first time. Since she first met him they had either been arguing, avoiding each other or embroiled in the stupid mess that was her life. Of course it had registered that he was an attractive man. She had witnessed a smile lighting up his face and anger highlighting the wrinkles at the corner of his eyes. Unfortunately the smile hadn't been aimed in her direction but some of the anger had. He had that annoying thing going on where men with silver in their hair looked more distinguished than old. And, over the past few days he had listened to her, understood her, empathised with her and, more importantly, been there for her.

Finn shook her head and walked into the kitchen to flick on the boiler and kettle. She had no idea where these fuzzy feelings were coming from. Well, actually, she did but she definitely didn't understand them. She was perfectly sure that the only feeling she should have for him at the moment was anger; anger that he had opened up wounds that were already raw; anger that her colleagues now looked at her with pity in their eyes; anger that he had been right. But she also couldn't forget the fact that a lot of what she felt at the moment was relief. She'd spent so long burying her head in the sand about the whole thing and how it affected her that she'd come to think of the burden she carried as the norm. What she had no, and what had helped her sleep better than she had in years, was closure; complete, total and utter closure. John Chambers was dead and he couldn't hurt her anymore.

Rossi woke up alone and apparently unable to move his arms. It took him a few seconds to realise that he had been tucked into a blanket. Struggling to get his arms free he realised that Finn wasn't on the sofa with him. He stood, stretched and felt something crack. I'm getting too old for sleeping on a sofa, he thought to himself.

Rossi wandered towards the kitchen and was relieved to see Finn sat at the table. She had her back to him and a cup of tea to the side of her. She was resting her head on her hands. She had pulled her hair into a ponytail and he could see the tattoo on the back of her neck. As Rossi looked at Finn he wondered what the future would hold for her. He had no doubt that she was a strong woman but he wasn't sure she would get through this unscathed. She had already been through so much when the whole thing first happened and he had absolutely no idea what she had been through when she was undercover. When Strauss finally gave him the information he asked for she made it perfectly clear that he would have no access to the rest of her confidential files, just the one he needed. But Finn had been undercover for a long time and from the little Strauss alluded to she had been involved in some serious action. Everyone had a breaking point and he hoped that Finn hadn't reached hers.

When Rossi had first met Finn he had been that pissed that she was being thrust into the team that he hadn't really paid much attention to her. Over the past week or so he had done nothing but look at her. He found her extremely attractive which was definitely going to cause his some problems. When she laughed little wrinkles appeared between her eyebrows. When she cried her nose and cheeks got red. And when she smiled at him like she had done in the bathroom in Reno, his heart missed a beat. Yup, he thought to himself, he had some serious atoning to do if he hoped she would even consider thinking of him as more than a colleague.

Rossi walked over and touched Finn gently on the shoulder. She jumped and tried to wipe away her tears before he could see them.

"Finn, what's wrong?" Rossi pulled out the chair next to her and took hold of her hands.

"I don't know. I started crying and then I couldn't stop."

"That's hardly surprising considering what you've been through. I'm surprised you're holding together as well as you are bella."

"It's all an act Rossi." Finn snorted. "I've had long enough to perfect it. I'm like a swan; graceful on the surface but paddling like fuck underneath."

"Bella you need to talk to someone. Therapy maybe?"

"I've tried therapy Rossi and it didn't work. I can't talk to a stranger about this. It's too painful and embarrassing."

"Embarrassing?"

"Eventually they want to see the scars, to see what it's all about and then they get that look on their face. The one that says that they're both horrified and disgusted by it." Finn wiped her eyes again with her sleeves and rubbed her temples.

"Not everyone will be disgusted by it Finn."

"You'll forgive me if I don't believe you Rossi. I'm sorry but I just don't."

"Show me."

"What?"

"Show me. You know I've seen them already. Show me again. Let me see them properly."

Rossi could see the turmoil on Finn's face and wondered whether he had pushed her too far. He knew that the scars caused her pain, both physically and mentally, and he wondered if the trust between them was such that she would say yes to his request.

Finn followed Rossi into her living room and hovered by the mantelpiece. When hovering didn't work she began to pace. She still didn't know if this was a good idea or not. She knew that Rossi had already seen them but she was passed out at the time. Not she was definitely awake she didn't know if she was ready to see the look on his face when he saw them again.

Rossi sat back on the sofa and crossed his legs. Finn was obviously still struggling with his request and he reasoned that it would be best to leave her to her thoughts. He was beginning to wish he'd never asked her. It seemed that he'd caused her more pain than he's intended. And that he'd been doing that since the first moment he met her.

Finn continued to pace her way up and down the room for so long that Rossi thought he had broken her; that her brain couldn't cope with the situation and had closed itself down. When he couldn't stand it any longer he stood up and grabbed her by her shoulders.

"Finn please stop pacing. I'm sorry. I should never have asked that of you. Honestly, you're not ready for it and that's fine. It's too soon but please stop pacing and let me cook us some breakfast."

"David just let me get this sorted in my head."

Rossi sat back on the sofa and rested his hands on his knees. Finn turned around slowly and came to stand in front of him. Very slowly she lifted her top up and held it just under her bra. Rossi looked up at Finn's face. She had screwed her eyes closed so tightly there were wrinkles where there never had been before.

Rossi reached out and touched Finn's stomach lightly. She flinched and tried to step back. Rossi put his hand around her waist and pulled her back towards him. Starting at the top of her stomach Rossi traced the shapes on her stomach. His fingers moved lightly over her skin, barely touching. Finn's breathing slowed and Rossi could feel her relax under his touch.

"I don't think you are horrible or disgusting Finn. Scars remind you where you've been. They don't have to dictate where you go."

Rossi stood up and unclenched Finn's fists from around her top and pulled it back down. He put his finger under her chin and lifted her face to his.

"Finn?"

"I don't believe you Rossi. I'm sorry but I just can't." whispered Finn, dropping her head back down to look at the floor.

"Finn look at me. Come on, look at me. There is nothing in the world that could make me think you are disgusting or horrible. In fact, I think you are pretty damn perfect."

Finn looked at Rossi, desperately trying to gauge how truthful he was being. She wanted to believe him; she needed to believe him and she hoped she was putting her faith in the right man.


	15. Chapter 15

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter Fifteen

Finn walked over to the window and leant against the window-sill. She looked out at her neighbourhood waking up in front of her. One of her neighbours walked out to his car with a paper in one hand and a travel cup in the other. He saw Finn watching him and waved with his paper. She waved back and stood up straight. Finn watched Rossi come up behind her through his reflection in the window. He put his hands on Finn's shoulders and started kneading them.

"You need to relax bella."

Finn leant her head back against Rossi's shoulder and he stopped massaging her. He slipped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer to him. They stayed like this for a while, watching Finn's neighbour get into his car and set off for his day. Rossi brushed Finn's hair off her neck and bent his head to kiss the uncovered skin. He hoped to god he hadn't read the signs wrong. Finn flinched and his heart sank; obviously he had. Goddammit, he thought, this woman is so bloody complicated.

"I'm not looking for a pity fuck Rossi." Finn turned in his arms and perched on the edge of the windowsill. Rossi didn't let go of her waist, just let her spin in his arms. He didn't want to break contact in case she walked away and didn't come back.

"That's not what this is Finn. This is about how I feel about you and how I hope you feel about me."

"Don't try to profile me Rossi."

"I don't need to profile you Finn. It's all over your face. You want someone to believe in you. You want someone who understands you. You want someone to hold you when you wake in the middle of the night. I want to be that person. I want to be there for you Finn." Finn reached up and touched Rossi's chin.

"You're asking me to trust you Rossi. After the less than auspicious start we had, not to mention all of this, you understand that it's difficult."

"But you just can't resist my Italian charm can you bella?" Rossi took Finn's hand from his cheek and kissed it lightly. "Finn, I can't tell you how sorry I am about the way I treated you when you first arrived and everything that's happened over the past few days."

"No you can't tell me but you have managed to show me. Trust needs to grow and be nurtured but I'm willing to give it a go if you are David."

"Finally the penny drops and the lady realises she can't resist my charm."

Finn laughed and kissed Rossi gently.

"You David Rossi are encouragable, but I like it. I like you."

Finn reached up and entwined her fingers in Rossi's hair and rested her arms on his shoulders. For a while they just looked at each other, then Rossi bent his head to Finn's and kissed her. He was gentle at first, nibbling on her bottom lip. Finn moaned and pulled Rossi closer. She probed at his lips with her tongue until he parted them to let her in.

Rossi slipped his hands under the back of Finn's top and brushed her bare skin. She recoiled and Rossi pulled his hands away quickly.

"I'm sorry bella."

"No you idiot," laughed Finn. "your hands are freezing. Warm them up before you do that again."

"Thank God for that."

"David, trust me. I am not going to stop you now."

Rossi buried his head in Finn's neck in response and nibbled her neck and earlobe. Finn moaned in response and pressed herself into him. Rossi's hands moved back under Finn's top and stroked her skin.

"I think we may need to move away from the window," Muttered Finn. "otherwise my neighbours are going to see more than they should at this time in the morning."

Rossi stepped back and took Finn's hand. He led her from the living room into the hallway. Finn stopped and pulled his back towards her. She pushed him against the wall, one thigh between his legs and kissed him fiercely. Rossi growled and grabbed Finn's arse and pulled her closer to him. Finn giggled and pushed herself into Rossi harder. Finn slid her hands under Rossi's t-shirt and pushed it upwards. She stepped back and tugged it over his head and threw it on the floor. Rossi tugged at Finn, trying to get her back to her previous position but she twisted out of his grasp and sashayed towards the bedroom. Stopping outside her bedroom door she paused, pulled her top over her head, threw it at Rossi and walked into the bedroom. Rossi shook his head and followed her.

Finn lay with her head on Rossi's chest and threw her leg over his. Rossi pulled her as close to him as he possibly could. Neither of them wanted to put any space between themselves. Finn traced shapes on Rossi's chest and he played with her hair. They lay together in silence for what seemed like an age. Rossi though that Finn had fallen asleep; her breathing was steady and she had stopped moving her hand.

"You know, I tried to hate you for raking all this up again but no matter how I tried, I couldn't and do you know why?"

"Why don't you tell me bella?"

Finn pushed herself up so she was resting on one elbow. With her free hand she traced a line down Rossi's face ending at his lips. He opened his mouth and licked her finger. He took hold of her hand and pulled it away from his mouth.

"Because no matter where we are or what we're doing, if I'm with you I feel totally safe; like nothing in the world can hurt me and I've never felt like that before."

TWO MONTHS LATER

The sound of his cell phone ringing roused Rossi from a deep sleep. Rossi groaned when he realised Finn had changed his ringtone to the theme from the Rocky movies. He dis-entangled his hand from Finn's and fumbled on the bedside table for his phone.

"My gorgeous Italian stallion, you are hereby formally requested to get your butt into the office ASAP. From the look on Hotch's face, we've caught a nasty one."

"OK Garcia," mumbled Rossi. "I'll be in as soon as I can."

"Oh, and Agent Rossi."

"Yes Garcia?"

"Can you give Finn a nudge and bring her in too? Saves me calling her."

"How the hell did you know?" asked Rossi. If Garcia knew there was no point in arguing with her.

"I may not be a profiler but I do have eyes and the pair of you have been making eyes at each other for the past couple of months."

"Sure Garcia, I'll tell her."

"Over and out my sex machine."

Rossi was still staring at his phone when Finn stirred and looked up at him sleepily.

"Hey bella," Rossi kissed the top of Finn's head. "Duty calls."


	16. Chapter 16

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter sixteen

Rossi and Finn walked into the conference room with Garcia following closely behind. Finn had grilled Garcia on how much the others knew of her relationship with Rossi. Garcia assured her that there had been whisperings but that none of the others seemed to mind. Finn had already had the discussion with Rossi on the journey into the office about whether now was the time to tell the others. Rossi agreed that they should but suggested that they wait until the end of whatever this investigation brought.

Finn flopped into a chair and picked up her tablet PC. She searched for the new information that should have been uploaded do it but it was empty.

"PG, where's todays files?"

"I don't know. Hotch is running with this one pretty close to his chest."

"Does anyone have any idea why we're here?" asked Rossi as he put a cup of coffee in front of Finn.

"I've not seen him since I got here." said Prentiss.

"I checked in when I got here but he told me to wait in here." said Morgan. "Thanks for the coffee Rossi."

"You've got legs Morgan."

"So does Finn." Muttered Morgan under his breath.

Hotch came into the conference room and his gaze sought out Finn and Rossi.

"Agents Rossi and Beckett, my office please? The rest of you can familiarise yourselves with the data I've uploaded."

Hotch turned and walked back out of the conference room without pausing to see if Finn and Rossi were following him. Finn stood silently and followed Rossi out of the door. Hotch was already in his office by the time the pair of them exited the conference room.

"He knows," whispered Finn to Rossi. "He knows about us and he looks pissed."

"Bella, even if he does know, it will be fine. Don't worry."

"Don't worry from the already decorated Agent Rossi."

Rossi rubbed the small of Finn's back, trying to calm her down before they faced Hotch. Finn was right, Hotch did look pissed. Rossi made the mental decision to take all the flak for their relationship, no matter what Finn said or did.

"Trust me bella."

Finn shook her head and walked through Hotch's open door. Hotch was pacing behind his desk. He motioned for Finn and Rossi to sit down. Finn noticed there was just one file on Hotch's usually crowded desk.

"What's going on Aaron?" asked Rossi. He looked over and Finn and could see her hands were shaking. He resisted the urge to take her hand tell her that it was fine.

Hotch stopped pacing and handed the file from his desk to Rossi.

"This communication was received three hours ago here at the BAU. As far as we could tell it's genuine."

Rossi opened the file and looked through the contents. His face went pale. He looked at Hotch and Hotch was sure he could see tears in his friends' eyes.

"Are you sure this is genuine?" Rossi asked quietly.

"As sure as we can be Dave."

"What?" Finn asked looking from Hotch to Rossi and back again. "Is someone going to tell me what's going on?"

Hotch opened his mouth to answer her but Rossi got there before him. He took Finn's hand and she looked at him with wide-eyed surprise. Rossi didn't care. From what he had just seen Hotch knew the nature of their relationship and soon so would everyone else on the team. All he cared about now was explaining to Finn what was going on without crushing the person he had come to love in the past couple of months.

"Bella." Rossi started but Finn snatched the file out of his hands and opened it herself.

Finn looked through the picture inside the folder and read the note that accompanied them. The pictures inside the folder were of Finn and Rossi. The first few had been taken over two weeks ago when they were sat in a coffee shop one lazy Sunday morning. The last couple had been taken just a few days ago and showed Rossi and Finn coming out of the cinema; Rossi had his arm around Finn and showed him kissing the top of her head. The note was concise and to the point.

I see you FBI Agents.

You shot the wrong man Agent Rossi.

Agent Beckett I look forward to seeing you again.

I can't wait to finish what I started.

Watch your back Agent Beckett. I'm coming to get you.

Finn closed the folder and put it back on Hotch's desk. Rossi took hold of her hand again which made her shift her gaze to him.

"But you shot him David. You shot him and I saw his body in the morgue and now he's back? It was him. I know it was him. I saw his face David. I don't understand how he is back."

Hotch knelt in front of Finn and took her free hand. Both agents were staring at her, waiting for her to have some sort of reaction.

"Finn, we will figure this out."

"No disrespect Hotch but you said that last time. Both of you did."

Finn stood and walked away from both of the men. The rest of the team had come out of the conference room and were huddled together talking in hushed voices in the bull pen.

"Finn, where are you going?" asked Hotch.

"To the bathroom."

Hotch followed Finn out of the door and called to Prentiss.

"Don't let her out of you sight. We'll debrief once Finn's collected herself."

Prentiss nodded and followed Finn out of the room. Hotch watched them go before he shut his door and turned his attention to Rossi. Rossi was leant forward with his head in his hands.

"You should have told me Dave. How long have you been seeing her?"

"Since we got back from Reno more or less."

Hotch slumped into the chair next to Rossi and looked at his friend. Rossi was still pale and looked a little nauseous.

"You should have told me." he said more quietly than before.

"We were going to after this case was over. Guess we don't have to now huh?"

Rossi rubbed his face with his hands. Hotch sat back and waited for his friend to talk to him.

"So if we got this all wrong, that means that I shot an innocent man in Reno."

"We don't know that Dave. All the evidence we had pointed to him. Finn confirmed that the man in the morgue was the unsub. He is involved in this, just not in the way we thought he was."

"There's a difference between being involved and being guilty Hotch."

"Dave, you made a decision based on the information we had. That was all you could do. No one is going to question the justification of your shooting."

"How did he manage to pull the wool over our eyes Hotch? How come he is still out there and we have to put Finn through this again. And with a direct threat too. She isn't going to be able to leave the bureau without an escort. And for how long? How do we know that the next guy we think is good for this is the right guy?"

"We will do the same as we always have done Dave. I meant what I said to Finn. We'll figure this one out."

"I'm sorry but I share the same cynicism as Finn on that one."

"There is one other thing Dave." Rossi leant back in his chair. "Finn isn't the only one in danger here. The letter contains an indirect threat to you too. Finn isn't the only one who is going to need an escort. I don't want you going anywhere on your own. There's a chance he might hurt you as a way of getting to Finn. He knows the nature of your relationship now and he'll use that against her."

"So what, we're both under BAU arrest?"

"Something like that. I want the pair of you here working the case and the rest of the team will be out in the field. Besides which, Finn is going to need someone she trusts to look after her and calm her down. Looks like that's your role now."


	17. Chapter 17

I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.

Chapter seventeen

"Hey Finn, you in here?" Prentiss walked into the bathroom and pushed open the first two stall doors. She stopped when she came to the third one and knocked lightly on it. "Finn, answer me."

"Emily I'm fine. Seriously. I just need a few minutes on my own. Please."

"Look, I'll wait outside for you but I'm not going any further than that."

Finn leant forward and held her head in her hands. The woman part of her wanted to cry and scream but the FBI agent in her head was winning over and stopping her from letting go. The time to let go would be when they had caught this bastard. The right one this time. She was confused and her head was spinning. The guy on the slab in Reno had been the one who had captured her. She was sure of it. His was the face that had haunted her nightmares since that day and still did now. But now either there was someone else out there who knew everything that had happened to her or there had been a second person involved; one that she hadn't seen or heard. Questions flooded her brain but the main one was, if there was a second perpetrator, where had he been the night she escaped and the day that Rossi shot John Chambers.

Finn heard the bathroom door open and listened to footsteps until she could just about make out a pair of feet standing in front of her stall. She sighed and sat up straight.

"Emily, I thought you were going to wait outside?"

"Bella, it's me."

Finn reluctantly stood and opened the stall door. Rossi was stood outside with such a look of love on his face that she felt her heart start to break and the tears start to well up. Rossi stepped towards Finn and pulled her towards him. There was a time when she would have kept her distance, pulled away from his embrace and dealt with this pain on her own but that time had gone. From the very first moment she knew his intent towards her was pure and filled with love she hadn't pulled away from him once and she wasn't about to start now. Rossi stroked her hair and whispered Italian phrases in her ear. Slowly she began to relax and the tears stopped threatening to fall. She took a few deep breaths and Rossi loosened his grasp on her.

"Part of me knew that this wasn't over; the situation felt wrong, the nightmares were still there. I should have known that things wouldn't be this simple."

"Bella, there was no way you could have known that. You'd just lived with it for so long that you didn't know how it felt to not have it at the back of your mind."

"Well it turned out I was right didn't it? There's someone out there who is going to bring all of this back to the forefront of my mind. Someone who's determined to torture me even further."

"Bella, we will fix this. The team will fix this."

"Yeah, you and Hotch already told me that. In fact I think the pair of you have told me that a few times now. I'm sorry Rossi but I just can't believe that everything is going to be ok because the team is here."

"Have faith Bella." Rossi reached out to touch Finn's face but she moved from his touch and towards the door.

"Any faith that I ever had disappeared when my partner was murdered and I got the permanent reminders on my stomach." Finn strode out of the bathroom, leaving Rossi alone. He turned to face the mirror and ran a hand through his hair. Cazzo, he muttered under his breath as he followed in Finn's wake.

Finn strode back into the bullpen with more confidence than she felt. She was fighting against the feeling that she wanted to run away; away from her problems and away from the people she had come to think of as her family. She stopped in the doorway and watched the rest of her team as they busily went about their business. She could see Hotch in his office on the phone to someone, the stress evident by him running his free hand through his hair over and over again. He looked rattled and that wasn't something she was used to seeing on his face. Prentiss was walking into the incident room, her arms full of papers and her face grim. Garcia was making everyone calming cups of chamomile tea. Finn watched her as she dropped a spoon on the floor. The poor woman looked like she was about to burst into tears at any moment. Of all the team, she took things to heart the most and this looked like it was about to finish her off. Finn walked over to her desk and sat down. She picked up the fairy ornament that Rossi had given her. She'd told him once that when she was little she used to believe that there were fairies at the bottom of her garden. She used to go and talk to them when things were hard for her. She wished she had a fairy now to whisk her away.

"Hey Finn," Morgan pulled up a chair and sat next to her. Hotch arrived next, closely followed by Rossi. "We have something we need to ask you." Finn put the ornament back on her desk and turned to face him.

"If it takes three of you to ask me, I'm guessing that I'm not going to like it."

"We need to take you through everything that happened when you were taken. If there were two unsubs then the second one will have been there. We need to find out if you remember anything."

"Morgan, that's already been done. I went over and over it when I was being debriefed. There's nothing else I can tell you."

"I know it's already been done but we have to try. There's been a direct threat to you and an indirect threat to Rossi. We need to make sure we have every single piece of information we can have if we're going to catch him and put this nightmare to bed for you once and for all."

"Ok."

"We'll do it in my office. I'll get everything set up. Give me five minutes."

Finn turned and watched Morgan's retreating back. Hotch went straight to the incident room, leaving Finn alone with Rossi.

"Bella, if you're not comfortable doing this with Morgan, I can walk you through it instead."

"Why would I have a problem with Morgan doing this?" Finn's words were more venomous than she had intended them to be but she didn't apologise.

"I just thought that you'd be more comfortable with me that's all."

"David Rossi," Finn stood. 'You are not the only person in here with whom I am comfortable. I will be fine with Morgan." Finn walked off in the direction of Morgan's office with Rossi following her. She turned on her heel to face him. "Are you following me now?"

"I was going to come in with you, make sure you are ok."

"I don't want you in there."

"Bella please….."

"I said no Agent Rossi. I do not need babysitting and I don't need you to hold my hand all the time."

Rossi watched Finn walk away from him for the umpteenth time today and wondered what the hell he had done.

Finn knew she was being unreasonable with Rossi but for some reason she just couldn't help herself. She knew she needed to ease up on him but right now there was only one thing she could concentrate on. If she was going to re-live this again she needed to close off as much of her emotions as she could to get through it.

Morgan's door was open when she walked up to his office. She knocked lightly on the doorframe and walked in. Morgan looked up from his desk as she closed the door behind her.

"Ok, we need to get this over and done with as soon as possible."

"Where's Rossi?"

"I don't want him in here."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes of course I'm sure."

"Ok." Morgan walked from behind his desk towards Finn. He took her hand and pulled her in the direction of his sofa. "We can do this however you want us to Finn. You can sit on a chair or lay on the sofa. Whichever is going to be the most comfortable for you."

Finn sat on the sofa and put her hands on her knees. Then she kicked her shoes off and lay on the sofa instead. She closed her eyes and waited for Morgan to start. She heard Morgan pull up a chair and get himself comfortable. When he spoke to her his voice was quiet and soothing.

'Ok Finn. I'm going to take you through what happened up to and after the night you met John Chambers in the bar and we'll go from there. You can stop anytime you want to. You know this is going to be distressing but you know we wouldn't do it unless it was absolutely necessary."

"I don't need the preamble Morgan, I just need to get this done."

"You're in the bar with Dan. You're having a drink, easy in each others' company. The guy at the table next to you says something to start a conversation. What does he say?"

"There's a game on the television in the bar. He asks Dan which team he supports. Dan answers him. I got up to go to the bathroom. When I came back he was sat at the table with Dan. I raised my eyebrows at him and he just shrugged. I figured he had everything under control."

"How long did Chambers stay at your table?"

"Not long. Probably another fifteen minutes."

"How much attention did he pay to you?"

"Hardly any. He was either looking at the television or looking at Dan."

"Are you sure he wasn't looking at anyone else in the bar? Think back and see if he makes eye contact with anyone there."

"There was a guy sat at the bar just to my right. He kept glancing at him. I figured he was just nervous cos the guy was huge."

"Huge how?"

"Bigger than you. You know, he looked like he worked out loads. He reminded me of a nightclub bouncer."

"Ok Finn, I want you to look to your right and have a good look at the guy sat at the bar. What does his face look like?"

"I don't know. I can't see. He was wearing a baseball cap and it was pulled down low like he didn't want anyone to see him. He was tall cos he dwarfed the guy stood next to him even though he was sat down."

"When Chambers left your table did he leave the bar?"

"Yeah, he walked straight out."

"Did the other guy leave at the same time?"

"No, he was still there when Dan and I left."

"Ok Finn, think back to the second time you met Chambers. Was it in the same bar?"

"Yeah, it was the only bar we went to. It was part of our surveillance."

"What did he say to you?"

"He just said hello and asked how we were. We sat at a different table and neither of us paid him a lot of attention."

"So, you and Dan are leaving the bar to go home. Who drives?"

"Dan. Dan always drove. He said he didn't trust me behind the wheel like he trusted me behind a gun." Tears started to run down the side of Finn's face. Morgan steeled himself for what was to come because whatever it was, it wasn't going to be pretty.

"So you got back to the house. Then what?"

"We went straight into the kitchen. I wanted a cup of tea before we filed our report that night. While I was putting the kettle on I remembered that it was trash collection day tomorrow so I asked Dan to put the trash out. I started to empty the dishwasher while Dan did that. I heard a crash from the utility room."

"Did that shock you?"

"Not really. Dan was a huge klutz; he was always dropping things. He'd broken nearly all the cups in the house in the first week."

"Then what did you do?"

"I called out and asked him what he had broken this time. He didn't answer straight away so I figured he had already gone outside to take out the trash. I carried on emptying the dishwasher. I didn't realise he hadn't come back in until I had finished. I called out again but he didn't respond. I went into the utility room to see what he was doing. I thought he was probably just trying to clean up whatever mess he'd made so that I wouldn't get mad at him."

"What did you see in the utility room?"

"Dan was on his back. Blood was pooling out from under him. He turned his head towards me and opened his mouth to say something but no sound came out." Tears were running freely now. Morgan wanted to reach over and take her hand to let her know she wasn't alone in this but any amount of contact, no matter how small, could snap her back to the present and they'd lose it all and have to start again.

"I need you to look around the utility room for me Finn. Does everything look as it should do?"

"There are some pots on the floor. They must have made the noise I heard."

"What else?"

"Nothing. Everything else looks like it should. The door outside is open. I don't think it should have been open. Dan never got outside with the trash. I can hear it swinging in the wind." Morgan made a note to see if point of entry had ever been established.

"Where is Chambers Finn?"

"He's in front of me. He's come from my right and he's holding a knife up to me and pushing me back into the kitchen. Dan's still watching me. Oh God, he looks so scared. He died alone. The last thing he saw was me being pushed away from him at knifepoint. That's the last thing he saw. Oh God." Finn's breathing became shallow and rapid. She was having a panic attack. Morgan was going to have to risk breaking the train of thought. He reached over and took one of Finn's hands and held it in his.

"Finn, it's ok. You're ok. You're safe. You're here with me and you're safe. I need you to take some deep breaths and calm down. We're almost done honey. I just need you to think some more." Morgan kept rubbing Finn's hand in-between his own and waited for her to calm down some. "Ok Finn. It won't be long now. I promise. What did Chambers do then?"

"He had me pinned against the kitchen island. He had the knife to my throat. I knew my gun was in the sideboard in the living room. I pushed him off me and tried to get it but I was too slow. He hit me and I fell into the doorframe and I blacked out."

"Right before you blacked out what do you remember?"

"I remember pain. It hurt when he hit me and then when I hit the doorframe. I remember lying on the floor because the carpet was scratchy on my face. I can see his feet coming towards me. He's got really dirty trainers on…. Oh God.'

"Finn what is it?"

"There's someone else there."

"How do you know?"

"I can see another pair of feet. They're wearing cowboy boots, black cowboy boots."

"Finn, can you hear anything?"

"I can hear a voice. I don't think it's Chambers though. This one is deep and sounds like it's from Texas."

"What did he say Finn?"

"He said 'what have you done you stupid bastard? I told you not to hurt her.'"


	18. Chapter 18

I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.

Chapter eighteen

Morgan pulled Finn back to reality and quickly and as gently as he could. She sat up on the sofa and he went to fetch her a bottle of water. Mascara stains ran down her face from where she'd been crying. She looked like a band member from Kiss.

"You stay here and get yourself together. I'll be back in a bit."

Finn pulled her legs up underneath her and cuddled one of the garishly coloured cushions Garcia had furnished Morgan's office with. Rossi was pacing the floor outside Morgan's office when Morgan stepped outside.

"Is she ok?" he asked, the worry evident on his face. He continued pacing while waiting for Morgan to answer.

"She's fine Rossi. She held it together surprisingly well. Your bella is made of sterner stuff that we realised." Rossi pushed past Morgan and put his hand on the door handle. Morgan stopped him from opening the door. "Give her a minute or two will you? I think she needs some time to get her head together. And you need to hear what she said."

Rossi reluctantly followed Morgan into the incident room where the others were all assembled going through the now no longer classified files detailing the case from beginning to end.

"You know she was involved in some pretty tough stuff." said Reid as the others walked in. "She was undercover a lot and for long periods of time. Studies have shown that this can cause problems with the undercover agent being able to hold onto their own identity. A kind of blurring of the lines between reality and their undercover persona."

"I think she's come out of it pretty well when you read her file. Morgan, did you find anything useful?" asked Hotch.

"Well she remembers that there was another person in the bar the first night Chambers talked to her and her partner but she didn't get a good look at is face. She also remembers that there was someone else there the night she was taken. He was wearing black cowboy boots and spoke in a southern accent. She thought it was Texan."

"A Texan with cowboy boots. That narrows it down a bit." Prentiss sat back in her chair and pulled at her ponytail. "We're getting nowhere fast piling through all of this. We've got nothing on the note. We're going to have to wait until he makes contact again."

"I need to spend some more time with her; get her to talk through when she was captive."

"That's not going to be easy for her." said Hotch.

"Do you think it would be better if we put her under full hypnosis?" asked Reid. "I know someone who could help."

"Ok Reid, make contact with your hypnotist and get them over here straight away. Prentiss and Morgan, keep going through her files. You never know what you might find. Garcia have you come up with anything from the cameras outside the building?"

"Well sir, nothing. Nada. Absolute blank on that one. I've extended the time frame and expanded the amount of cameras so I'm utilising all the footage we have from around the building but there's a lot to go through so it's going to take me a while."

"Ok well you need to carry on with that. At the moment that's our only hope."

Rossi stood in the doorway of the incident room. It seemed that everyone was hard at work with something or other apart from him. He followed Hotch into his office and closed the door behind him.

"Something bothering you Dave?"

"Well apart from the fact that some sicko is out to get the woman I love no, everything is hunky-dory."

"I'm sorry Dave. That was a stupid question."

"I don't know what to do Hotch. I want to protect her and make all of this go away but I can't see a way we can do that without putting her in danger."

"Not just her Dave. The threat was aimed at you too, no matter how indirectly. You need to be aware of your own safety as well as Finn's. Look Dave, Finn is still in Morgan's office. You need to go to her and just be with her. She's going to be looking for reassurance and she'll want you to be the one to give it."

"I'm not too sure about that Hotch. She's closed herself off to me. She won't talk to me about any of this. I think she blames me for killing Chambers. And who knows, she may be right. If I hadn't have shot him we might have found out that he had a partner and this nightmare wouldn't have even come to fruition."

"You know how this works Dave. Chambers had set himself up for death-by-cop. He was going to die that day. There was no question of that or he would have come out of the house with his hands in the air. Instead he faced off several law enforcement officers with a gun in his hand. He only had one objective and he achieved it. There was no way any of us could have predicted this was going to happen. Go to her Dave and spend some time with her. She'll see sense eventually."

"I do hope you're right Aaron because there is no way I want to lose this woman."

Rossi left Hotch's office feeling slightly better about the whole situation. Hotch had confirmed to him what he already knew deep down. His shooting of Chambers was not at fault here and there was nothing he could have done to prevent this from happening. Now all he had to do was to convince Finn of that. He was sure that she knew in her heart that this was not his fault but she wasn't seeing things as clearly as she would normally do. Walking down the corridor to Morgan's office he resolved to stand and fight for his woman. She could scream at him, she could punch him, but he would not walk away from her when she needed him whether she liked it or not.

The door to Morgan's office was still closed when he approached it. He took a deep breath, hitched up his shoulders and tapped lightly on the door. He waited a few seconds but there was no sound from inside. He knocked louder, wondering if she had fallen asleep but there was nothing. He opened the door and walked in.

"Bella, I don't want to fight I just….." Rossi stopped mid-sentence and stared around the room. It was empty. "Shit."

Rossi turned on his heel and ran out of the room. He turned left and headed straight for the ladies bathroom where he burst unannounced through the door. The three stalls were empty and there was no one else in there. He charged out of the bathroom and further down the corridor to Garcia's office. One look confirmed that Finn wasn't in there either. Ignoring the strange looks of other agents he ran back down the corridor towards the bull pen. Finn wasn't there either. He ran into the incident room and looked frantically around.

"Rossi man, what's up?" asked Morgan, seeing the alarm on his colleague's face. Rossi didn't reply. He ran from the room straight into Hotch's office. Hotch was on the phone.

"She's gone."

"I'll have to call you back." Hotch put his phone in his pocket and turned to look at Rossi. "Are you sure?"

"I've checked Morgan's office, Garcia's office, the bathroom, the bull pen and the incident room. She's gone. Shit Hotch. What the hell is she doing? She knows she can't just walk out of here without drawing him….. Oh fuck."

Rossi didn't finish his sentence. Instead he ran back off to the incident room, Hotch close at his heels.

"Garcia can you pull up footage from the foyer, focussing on the doors for the last fifteen minutes?"

"Of course I can but what am I looking for?" Garcia started frantically typing away despite not understanding the situation. She pulled the information and projected it to the screen on the wall so everyone could see.

"Rossi, you want to fill us in here?" said Morgan but Rossi didn't hear him. He was stood in front of the screen watching the footage Garcia was playing.

"Finn has gone." Hotch answered for his friend, never taking his eyes off the scene either.

"What do you mean gone?" asked Reid.

"She's not answering her phone. It's going straight to voicemail." Prentiss put her phone back on the desk and walked over to the screen so she was stood next to Rossi.

"Pause Garcia. Pause it now." demanded Rossi. Garcia hit a button on her laptop and the image on the screen froze. 'Finn."

The image on the screen was a perfect profile shot of Finn as she walked out of headquarters and more than likely straight into the path of the unsub.


	19. Chapter 19

I** do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

Chapter nineteen

"Garcia, I need you to put a trace on Finn's phone. We have to find out where she is."

"Of course sir but what if she's turned it off. She knows how we work and if she really doesn't want to be found….." Garcia was typing as she was chattering, her fingers whirring over the keyboard.

"What the hell is she playing at?" asked Morgan. Morgan looked to Hotch for an answer but it was Rossi who spoke.

"She's drawing him out. She knows that he's going to be watching her and she knows that we have no leads so she's putting herself out there to lure him out of hiding."

"You can't be sure she's doing that. She might just need to get out of here for a while." said Reid although he knew how ridiculous that sounded as soon as he said it. He just didn't want to believe that Finn would put herself into so much danger.

"I'm sure. It's what I would have done." said Rossi as he pulled out his own phone and dialled Finn.

"But why didn't she come to us with that? We could have worked something out."

"Baby girl, there was no way we would have let that happen. That's why she didn't tell us."

"Dammit, she's not answering her phone Hotch." Rossi slammed his phone onto the table and slumped into one of the chairs.

"Garcia, we need that trace." Hotch moved to stand behind Garcia as she furiously typed commands into her laptop.

"Ok sir, we're up and running."

"Where is she?'

"She's heading out to …"

"Is she on her way home?" asked Reid as he came to join everyone standing behind Garcia.

"Of course she is." snapped Rossi. "It's where she feels the safest. She knows every inch of that house. If he comes to get her there it's the one place she thinks she'd have a chance in winning."

"Garcia, keep trying Finn's phone and her home phone. Try anything you can think of to contact her and once you've got her on the phone don't let her get off."

"Where are you going sir?"

"We're going to Finn's home."

The five of them ran out to their vehicles and sped out of the parking lot. Rossi was in the first car with Hotch; Prentiss, Reid and Morgan were in the car behind.

"There's two ways we can play this Dave. We can go charging in there all guns blazing and drag Finn back to the BAU or we can wait and stake out her place and see if the unsub really does come to her."

"We may as well finish what she started. She wants this over with as quickly as possible and she's not going to thank us if we go in and drag her out. It was the wrong way for her to go about it but it's probably the only way we have to find this bastard. We may have come to the conclusion eventually; she's just beaten us to it."

"That's a hot-headed woman you've got yourself there Dave."

"The only thing I'm bothered about is keeping her alive. She's got a good thirty minutes lead on us Aaron. What if he's already been there and he's taken her? If he's taken her anywhere she'll figure out a way to lead us there. Like you said before, she knows how we work and she knows that we'll have her back no matter what."

"We've got to get her back unharmed Aaron."

"We will Dave, we will."

Hotch dialled Morgan's phone and spoke to the second car.

"Guys we're going to approach slowly on this one. Rossi and I will go in from the north. Morgan I want you to approach from the south. Pull up somewhere discreet and wait."

"What? We're just going to leave her in there?" Morgan asked incredulously.

"Finn started this off so we're going to finish it her way. We'll surveil the area and take it from there. If the unsub does come after her then we'll have a better chance of catching him. Prentiss, when you guys stop I want you to approach the house and see what is going on. If you can't see anything, ring the doorbell. If Finn answers you need to find out if she's alone and find a way to convey to her what we are doing."

Prentiss looked at Morgan and raised her eyebrows. The plan didn't sit well with any of them but it was fast looking like it was the only thing they could do.

"Garcia, are you there?"

"Yes sir, all present and correct."

"Is Finn at home?"

"Yes sir, the phone tracker suggests she's in the area. I, erm, may have activated the tracker on her car, accidentally of course. That confirms that her car is outside her house."

"I don't suppose there are camera on her street?" asked Reid.

"Why yes my young supermind, there are cameras all down her street. I've accessed them and I'm watching live footage now. As far as I can tell the street is quiet; there's no unusual activity and no single male in the vicinity."

"Garcia, I want you to run all the plates of the vehicles you can see on the footage. Call Morgan and Reid when you have the information. We're looking for anything that seems out of the ordinary; a car that doesn't belong there for example."

"Yes sir, Garcia out."

Hotch watched as the car behind them pulled off down a side street so they could approach from the other side.

"We're going to stick out like a sore thumb if we park on the street." Hotch said.

"We can pull into the driveway of number 28. They're on holiday for the next couple of weeks so there's no danger of anyone coming out to see what we're doing."

Hotch followed Rossi's directions and pulled into the driveway of a small detached house. From their vantage point they could see Finn's house off to the left and further down the street. They watched as Morgan pulled the second vehicle into the side of the street. The front passenger door opened and Prentiss got out.

"Guys, I'm on my way in."

"Good. Keep the line of communication open Prentiss. We need to hear what Finn says."

"You should have let me go up there Hotch. I could have done this."

"Rossi, you're not in the right frame of mind for this. You would have barged in there without a second thought and put Finn in even more danger. In situations like this you think with your heart and not with your head."

Rossi opened his mouth to argue but then closed it again. Hotch was right. There was no way he could have knocked on Finn's door, spoken with her and then come away again. He'd want to be in there with her, protecting her, keeping her safe. Instead, he watched in silence as Prentiss approached Finn's house.

"Can't see anything obvious from the outside. There's no noise coming from the house and I can't see any movement. I'm going to knock on the front door."

Everyone watched as Prentiss knocked on the door of Finn's home. There was a short wait which seemed like an eternity to Prentiss before the door was opened.

"Can I help you?" asked Finn.

"Hi there. I'm lost. I was wondering if you direct me to Columbia park? I'm supposed to be meeting my friends there and I'm lost."

"Ah ok." Finn started gesturing as if she was giving directions. "Is everyone here?" Prentiss nodded. "Are they going to wait and let this play out?" Prentiss nodded again.

"That's great. Thanks so much for your help." Prentiss smiled at her friend and walked away.

Finn went back into her house and closed the door. She leant against it and took a deep breath. The house was secure, she was pretty much sure of that. Every door and window was locked and there was no nook or cranny that the unsub could use to let himself in. Her gun was in her holder at her waist and she had two others stashed in various parts of the house. She had put the sharp knives from the kitchen around the house too in case she couldn't get to a gun. Reaching into her handbag she pulled out her earpiece and put it in. Everyone was here, everyone knew what she had planned and she was grateful that they would do that. She could hear Prentiss filling the rest of the team in once she had reached her car. Rossi asked a question and Finn's stomach flipped. She was going to have a hell of a lot of explaining to do when this was all over. Rossi was not going to be happy with her. She thought back to their last conversation; one in which she more or less told him that this was all his fault. Tears stung at her eyes as she remembered the hurt look on his face. Picking up her phone she called him. He answered on the first ring.

"Bella."

"I'm sorry David. I'm sorry I blamed this on you and I'm sorry I didn't tell you what I was going to do."

"I would have stopped you."

"I know and that's why I couldn't tell you. I'm sorry David. I love you."

"I love you too Bella." but Rossi was speaking to dead air. Finn had already hung up.


	20. Chapter 20

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

**I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this at the moment so I'm just making it up as I go along. I hope you enjoy finding out as I do!**

Chapter twenty

Finn heard Rossi swear through her earpiece when he realised she had hung up on him. She slipped her phone back in her pocket and tried to stop the tears from falling.

Even before he said a word she knew someone was behind her. She stiffened and willed herself to turn around but her body wouldn't comply.

"Well if it isn't the great Agent Beckett. You forgot a window lock back there."

Finn turned around, gun in hand.

"I didn't forget anything." She pointed the gun at the man before her but reeled when she recognised his face. The events of that night slammed back into her mind with such force that she stumbled back and nearly lost her footing. "You're the cop that found me when I escaped."

"Oh Agent Beckett, you didn't escape anything. You were just part of the long game. Now I suggest you put down your gun and call off your team. Oh don't look surprised. I know how you FBI agents work and, to be perfectly honest, they stick out like a sore thumb in this neighbourhood." Finn hesitated. "Don't make me ask again Agent Beckett. Take out your earpiece and throw it to me and make the phone call to your beloved Agent Rossi and tell him and the rest of your team to leave."

"I think you misinterpret who has the upper hand here. I am the one stood in front of you with a gun in my hand pointing straight at your chest. You know who I am. You know I'm a good shot. At this distance you wouldn't stand a chance."

"All of that is true Agent Beckett but while you may be the one standing there with your firearm pointing at me, I am the one who is wearing this." He opened his coat to reveal a bomb vest. "Now I do believe you will do what I ask you or I will blow you and I to smithereens before your team can reach you."

"How do you know they're not already here?"

"Because they're letting this play out how you want it to be played out and they will only enter this building when you tell them to."

"It's not much of a long game if you're happy to blow us up without doing whatever it is you have spent the past couple of years fantasising about."

"You are but one in a long list of games I am playing. You are the one I've had the most fun with though. Now, do I have to ask you again or will you do as I ask?"

Finn pulled her earpiece from around her neck and threw it at the cop. He caught it in one hand, dropped it on the floor and stamped on it. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and dialled Rossi.

"Bella."

"Did you hear all of that?"

"We heard."

"Then you know what you have to do."

"Finn please."

"David, if you love me even half as much as I love you, you will do this for me. Please caro."

"Ti amo bella."

Finn ended the call and threw her phone towards the cop. He caught it in one hand.

"Well done Agent Beckett. I knew you would comply eventually. Now I suggest you put your gun on the table to your left and take your handcuffs out and cuff your wrists in front of you."

"Where are we going?" Finn put her gun on the table and cuffed herself.

"Oh you will find out soon enough."

The cop grabbed Finn by her handcuffed wrists and dragged her to the back door.

"Open it. That is unless you want to go out the way I came in."

Finn took her house keys from her bag on the kitchen table and unlocked the back door. The cop pushed her out of the door and towards a pick up that was waiting at the end of her garden.

"Are you at least going to tell me your name?"

"Trying to get into my head profiler?"

"I would just like to know the name of the next man that I kill."

"Such confidence. It is extremely misplaced."

"Humour me."

"Lance Steeple. Officer Lance Steeple."

"Well Office Steeple, are you a betting man?"

Rossi stared at the phone when Finn had hung up.

"Rossi?" Rossi ignored Hotch and spoke to the whole team.

"Morgan pull out. Head back to base. Hotch I need you to do the same."

"What? Rossi no?" came Morgan's voice.

"Don't argue Morgan. Just do it. Garcia, are you still watching the cameras?"

"Yes sir."

"Did you see any vehicles enter the vicinity?"

"There was just one vehicle which entered the vicinity. That is registered to an Officer Lance Steeple. He is an ex-cop. He left the force 2 weeks ago."

"Pull everything you can find on him. What does he look like?"

"I'm working on it. Oh, oh my. Officer Lance Steeple was pensioned off due to, erm, mental issues."

"That's his stressor. Well one of them at least." Hotch confirmed.

"What does he look like Garcia?" Rossi asked again not even trying to hide his agitation.

"He is 6'3", approximately 230 pounds and that looks like it's pure muscle. His head is shaven and guys he has the creepiest eyes I have ever seen."

"That's our man." Rossi said. "I'm sure of it."

"Garcia put an APB out on his vehicle. Tell them not to approach the vehicle but to monitor at a discreet distance but only if they are in an unmarked vehicle. We have to assume he is aware of the unmarked police vehicles so tell them to keep far back until one of us gets there."

"Morgan, don't go back to base. I want you to stay in the area in case we get a hit on the APB. Rossi and I are going to put a call in to his superiors and find out the details of his psych evaluation and dismissal."

"Hotch, this feels very wrong to me. There are too many ways for this to go down and hardly any of them have the outcome we want. If he really is having some sort of a psychotic break and he has explosives attached to his chest he'll not think twice about blowing himself and Finn up and anyone else who is around him." Prentiss looked at Morgan for back up.

"Hotch, I agree with Prentiss. We have no control over this anymore. He could be taking Finn anywhere and we have no idea where."

"We have time." Rossi said quietly.

"What do you mean?" asked Hotch.

"He's waited years to put this last part of his plan into action. If it wasn't for his dismissal and questions about his mental health he wouldn't be here. He doesn't want to rush with Finn. He wants to take his time and finish what he started. He'll want to relish what was done to her before and add to the scars. We have to start from the beginning and profile him as our suspect. There will be something in his life that will lead us to where Finn is. And if I know my girl as well as I think I do, she won't go down without a fight."

"I hope you're right Rossi because we're gambling with Finn's life here." said Prentiss.

Rossi didn't reply. He just ended the phone call and turned to Hotch.

"I know you're thinking the same thing as Prentiss; as the rest of the team. We have to focus on getting her back. I can't work if everyone is focussing on losing her."


	21. Chapter 21

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

**I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this at the moment so I'm just making it up as I go along. I hope you enjoy finding out as I do!**

Chapter twenty-one

Steeple opened the passenger side of the pick-up and pushed Finn in.

"Glove compartment. Open it. Take out the bottle and the cloth." Finn raised her eyebrows and looked at Steeple. "Oh please Agent Beckett, it's not like you don't know what to do with chloroform. On the cloth; over your mouth and nap time."

Finn didn't like what she was about to do but then she didn't really have that much choice in it all. She got herself comfortable in the seat, poured a generous amount of the liquid on to the cloth and placed it over her mouth. The last thing she saw before she closed her eyes and drifted off was the face of David Rossi when he had woken her up that morning.

Steeple climbed in to the truck next to Finn. He leant over her and pulled her seatbelt over so it clicked in to place. He reached up and stroked Finn's cheek. She looked so peaceful, so innocent. But he knew different. He knew what she was really like underneath it all; so ugly. And not just the scars he'd inflicted on her belly. He was glad he hadn't touched her face. It meant that he had something he could do to her now.

Steeple had several routes out of the area in his head. He knew he needed to avoid the FBI and police if he was to be able to get the time alone with Finn that he really wanted, that this was all about.

Steeple pulled his truck in to the underground car park and turned off the ignition. He was pretty sure he hadn't been followed but he couldn't be sure. He'd better get her out of the truck as quickly as he possibly could and get her tucked away in the basement. He'd spent ages looking for the right venue. He knew he'd have to stay within the city limits. As soon as he left the densely populated area he would be easier to track. He climbed out of the truck and went round to the passenger side. He pulled Finn out and put her over his shoulder. He closed the door with his foot and headed off towards the basement.

Once he'd found the right place to keep her, he'd set about making it the exact replica of where he had held her the first time. She'd managed to get away that time but there was no way she was leaving alive this time. But then again, it wasn't him she'd managed to get away from. It was the stupid idiot he'd left to watch over her. He'd managed to catch her again by being in the right place at the right time but he'd made a decision then. He'd decided to let her go and play the long game. And now it was time to end the game.

He threw Finn on to the bed and tied her arms to the bed-frame. She was going to have one hell of a shock when she came round.

"Aaron, what are we doing here?" Rossi turned to face his friend as they pulled in to the parking lot at Quantico.

"You can't be in the field for this one Dave, you know that. You're going to have to follow this one from here."

"Hotch, you cannot be serious."

"David, do not protest. You're lucky I'm not handcuffing you to some railings. There is no negotiation on this one. Go inside, find Garcia and help her out there,"

Hotch pushed Rossi out of the SUV and drove off before he could see the look of hurt on his friends face. He didn't want to make him stay in headquarters but there was no way he could watch Rossi out in the field as well as trying to find Finn. Hotch pushed some buttons on his phone and called Garcia.

"Garcia, Rossi is on his way up to you. I want you to keep an eye on him and keep him there with you. Don't let him leave. Use force if necessary."

"Force sir?"

"I was joking Garcia. Just keep him there. Give him something to do. Make him feel useful."

"Ok sir. Yes sir. I can do that."

"Of course you can. Do you have anything?"

"Not yet sir. I have put out an APB on Steeple's truck but no hits so far. I have tried to dig in to his life and find something we can use but there isn't anything useful."

"Keep digging Garcia."

"Wakey wakey sleepy head."

Finn opened her eyes a little. She was tired; and confused. Her eyes felt like lead. She tried to rub her eyes with her hands but she couldn't move them. What the hell was going on?

"Don't force it Agent Beckett. The memories will come eventually."

What the f…? And then all the memories hit at once. She remembered leaving Quantico, Prentiss coming to her door to let her know that the team was there for her, the cop who found a way in to her house, the conversation she has with Rossi…. Oh Rossi. What had she done?

"That's it. You're remembering now. I can see it in your eyes. That's good Agent Beckett. It makes my work so much easier. Now this must be bringing back some memories. You, me, the bed. You in your underwear. Especially you in your underwear. You've lost some weight since then. It doesn't suit you. You need some more meat on your bones."

"Well that is generally what happens when you escape a psycho who carves things in to your stomach."

"Escape?" Steeple jumped on to the bed and straddled Finn. His face was inches from Finn. He screamed at her. "Escape? You didn't escape you stupid bitch. I let you go. I could have stopped you when you ran in to my car but I didn't. I let you carry on believing that all of this was behind you; that all you had to do was to get over your scars and your life would be great again. Well newsflash Agent Beckett, you don't get a happy-ever-after. There's no walking off in to the sunset for you and Agent Rossi. There'll be tears, plenty of tears, mainly shed by him as he watches your team carry your coffin. But there'll be no happy ending for you."

Finn bucked relentlessly on the bed but she could not shift Steeple from where he straddled her. His hands closed around her neck and he started to squeeze. Finn struggled. She bucked and kicked but she could not move him. He was a dead weight pressing down on her chest; knees squeezing breathe out of her lungs and fingers stopping air from reaching her lungs.

Finn stopped moving and Steeple climbed off her. He put his fingers to her neck and checked she was still breathing. He was worried he'd got a little carried away and had killed her prematurely. He reached under the bed and pulled out a camera. Time to take some happy snaps to send to Agent Rossi.


	22. Chapter 22

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

**I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this at the moment so I'm just making it up as I go along. I hope you enjoy finding out as I do!**

Chapter twenty-two

"Garcia, oh my god. Garcia, you have to trace this."

Penelope looked up to see Agent Rossi running down the corridor towards her with his phone in his hand like it was the Holy Grail.

"Sir, Agent Rossi, what is it?"

"Email to my personal email address. Pictures of Finn. You need to trace this."

"That I can do sir."

Garcia's hands flew across her keyboard as she looked in to the origins of the email. Rossi watched over her shoulder.

"Garcia…" his tone was warning.

"I'm going as fast as I can sir. I'd go a lot faster if you weren't looking over my shoulder quite so intently."

"Ok, ok. I'm sorry."

"Ok, here we go. That email was bounced all over the place before it landed at you. It's going to take me forever to sift my way through all of that. I'll make a start but I don't think I'll make enough progress for it to be useful."

Rossi paced the length of Garcia's office, wringing his hands as he did so. He jumped when something behind him starting beeping.

"Garcia, what the hell is that?"

"Oh my, oh my. That's a hit on the APB." Garcia dialled Hotch. "Agent Hotchner, we have a hit on the APB. I'm sending the co-ordinates to your phone."

"Good Garcia. Call Morgan. Get him to meet us at the destination. Oh and Dave, you are not to leave the building. I will have security stop you if I need to but you are not to come anywhere near this operation while it's active."

"I understand Hotch. Please, just find her."

Hotch met the rest of the team on the street above the underground garage. The local police force had cordoned off the garage and had stopped people from coming in and out. The buildings above the garage has been evacuated. Nothing had been left to chance.

"Do we have eyes in the garage?" Hotch asked.

"No, there are no cameras anywhere on the parking level. There are camera in the elevators. Garcia is looking through the footage but it doesn't look like Finn was taken above ground that way. Garcia's also looking at footage from the street level but she's come up blank there too. Unless there's another way out we don't know about, Finn is still somewhere in that parking garage."

"Ok, so we're going to have to go in. Do we have any plans for the structure so we know what we're dealing with?"

"Garcia has just send us some electronic ones over." Prentiss put her tablet on the bonnet of the SUV and started pointing out pertinent points. "This is where we are at the main entrance. These are the elevators. There are two; one at either end of the garage."

"What's that bit?" Reid pointed to a small area at the back of the garage which didn't appear to be part of the parking structure.

"Baby girl, bottom left of the plans you sent us. What is that space? We need you to find out as much as you can." Morgan paced with his phone to his ear while Garcia did her magic. "Right, got it PG. Thanks. Ok, that is what used to be the janitors closet. According to records, it isn't used any more."

"Right, well I'm guessing that he has Finn there. We go in as quietly as we can. And guys, our number one perogative is getting Finn out of there alive. If we have to do that by taking Steeple down."

Everyone nodded their agreement and went about preparing themselves for going in. Morgan pulled Hotch to one side.

"Hotch, I think we should get Rossi down here. Garcia too."

"No way. Surely you understand that Rossi being here is too much of a risk?"

"I understand that just fine Hotch, but I'm thinking about what happens when we get to Finn. She's going to want to see Rossi as soon as possible when we get her out and he's going to want to see her. And Finn is just as much Garcia's team mate and friend as she is ours. You know PG is mobile and to be honest, by the time they get down here, it's all going to be over anyway."

"Fine but this one is on your head Morgan."

Finn's brain woke up a few seconds before the rest of her body did which was extremely beneficial. She willed herself still and tried to focus on her breathing. She could hear Steeple walking around the room. She had no idea what he was doing but she guessed that the noise of steel on steel wasn't going to produce a good end result. This wasn't a situation she had expected herself to be in when she woke up this morning. But then it would seem that her brain had stopped working right around the time she found out that Steeple had threatened Rossi. It had been a long time since Finn had been made to feel beautiful by a man and Rossi was responsible for that. If putting herself in Steeple's sights was going to save Rossi, then that was what she was going to do no matter what happened to her.

The bed creaked as Steeple sat down next to her. He leant over her and ran his finger down her face.

"I know you're awake Agent Beckett. Please open your eyes."

Reluctantly Finn opened her eyes and looked at Steeple. Part of her knew that she should be taking in her surroundings, noting everything in case it was needed in court but she really didn't want to look at him without being able to hurt him.

"Ah good, you're back in the land of the living although for how long who can say? Now, you and I are going to have a little catch up while we wait for your friends to show up and try to rescue you."

"Need water."

"Ah yes I suppose you do need some lubrication if we're going to talk."

Steeple produced a bottle of water and held it up to Finn's lips. She gulped as much down as she could.

"Now what shall we talk about? I know, how about you and the wonderful Agent Rossi? I have to admit I haven't seen you smile as much until you met him. He does make you feel special doesn't he? Must be because he's so much older than you; a father figure if you will. I'll be honest, I would have thought Agent Morgan would have been more to your taste but I guess a fit, young man like him wouldn't be interested in someone like you."

"Someone like me?"

"Yes, someone like you Agent Beckett. You're scarred; emotionally and physically. Sure you're pretty enough with your clothes on but when you are stripped to your underwear," Steeple ran his hands down Finn's chest and rubbed them over her belly. "well, when you're stripped to your underwear everyone can see exactly how ugly you are."

"I'm not ugly Steeple. I have battle scars inflicted by you but they are just part of what makes me who I am. Nothing you say is going to affect me here Steeple. I spent a lot of time in therapy coming to terms with what happened; with what you did to me and there is nothing else you can do that will hurt me any more than you already have done."

"We'll see how you come to terms with your life when the scars are a little more visible to the people you claim to love you."


	23. Chapter 23

**I do not own Criminal Minds or any of the characters represented in this entirely fictional story.**

**I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this at the moment so I'm just making it up as I go along. I hope you enjoy finding out as I do!**

Chapter twenty-three

Hotch followed Morgan down the parking ramp and towards the back of the garage. Prentiss and Reid followed closely behind along with a whole army of SWAT. They arrived at their destination quickly and quietly. Hotch held up his right hand and the team stopped. Taped to the door in front of them was a note and it was addressed to the whole of the BAU. Morgan inched forward and pulled it from the door.

Members of the BAU, I suggest that you all take a few steps back. I have wired this place to blow and have no compunction about doing that and blowing your much-loved Agent Beckett to bits. If anyone other than Agent David Rossi enters this room, then everyone will die. I suggest you go back and regroup and send an unarmed Rossi in.

Morgan read the note, shook his head and passed it to Hotch. Hotch scanned it quickly, then motioned for everyone to come back the way they came. No one questioned his decision, they just all followed his lead.

They all came to a stop at the top of the car ramp to regroup.

"Why didn't we just storm in Hotch?" asked Reid. "We'd have been able to take him down before he did anything."

"We can't take that chance Reid, you know that."

"But that's Finn in there. We can't just stand here and do nothing."

"We're not Reid. Morgan, find out how far out Rossi is. Prentiss and Reid, try to come up with another plan in case Rossi isn't fit to go in."

Five minutes later the team stood and watched and Rossi and Garcia climbed out of the SUV. Garcia had obviously been crying; her eyes were red and puffy and she had mascara down her cheeks. Rossi was more composed although everyone could see the tears that were threatening to spill down his face.

"Aaron, what's going on?" Rossi didn't bother to greet the rest of the team; didn't bother with the preamble. He wanted to get this over and done with and hold Finn in his arms.

"We found this on the door when we got down there," Hotch handed the note to Rossi. "He wants you to go in there. Unarmed and alone."

"Ok let's do it." Rossi was already shrugging off his jacket ready to put on his bulletproof vest.

"Rossi you know what you need to do in there don't you? You're going to have to keep calm and reason with him. You can't resolve this situation with brute force."

"I know that Hotch. I've done this a thousand times before." Rossi snapped.

"Yes you have David, but never when it involved someone you love." Hotch held his friends shoulder and squeezed. Rossi nodded his head in acknowledgement of his friends' unsaid words.

Garcia walked over to join the pair of them. She held a small case in her hands.

"Don't ask me where I got these or how I did. Just use them and be done with it." She rested the case on the hood of the SUV, opened it and started pulling things from it. "Ok this goes in your ear. It's a tiny little earpiece and hopefully he won't notice that it's there. This is a camera, it will feed images directly to us." She clipped it on to Rossi's collar. "The camera also has an audio function so we'll be able to hear what is going on too."

Garcia stood back and looked at Rossi then threw herself at him, enveloping him in a huge hug,

"You be careful in there. We love you both." She whispered in Rossi's ear.

Rossi took a deep breath and started on his way down the ramp. His palms were sweaty and his heart was thumping in his chest. He had no idea how this was going to go down. He had no gun and there was no way he could go hand-to-hand with this guy. He felt in the small of his back for the knife he had hidden there. He hoped that Steeple wouldn't feel the metal through the vest.

Rossi opened the door and walked slowly in. There was one light in the corner of the room; a bare lightbulb which didn't provide much illumination. Rossi could see a bed at the far side of the room. Finn was on it. Rossi could see what he thought was blood illuminated against the white of the mattress.

"Finn?"

"Finn isn't really up to speaking right now Agent Rossi. Now if you don't mind closing the door behind you and turning to face the wall with your arms above your head a shoulders width apart. I'm sure you understand what I have to do."

Rossi took a long look at Finn before he turned to face the wall. She didn't look at him but he could see then gentle rise and fall of her chest. She was alive. He didn't know what state she was in but she was definitely alive.

Steeple patted Rossi down but didn't find the knife he had hidden away. Rossi let out a breath he didn't know he was holding and turned back round to face Finn.

"So Officer Steeple, you have what you wanted. Finn and I are here. Now what do you want to happen?"

"Well let's see. We'll start with you making your way slowly over to the bed. Very slowly. No sudden movements. I want you to sit next to your beloved Finn."

Rossi moved over to the bed and sat next to Finn. He leant over her and she opened her eyes. She smiled and his heart broke. So much of his plan relied on her being strong and looking at her now he wasn't sure she would be strong enough.

"Bella," he whispered. "are you ok?"

Finn tried to speak but her mouth was dry and she couldn't get the words out. She nodded instead. Rossi ran his hand up her arms and leant down to kiss her forehead.

"You're going to be fine bella, just fine."

"Touching but most definitely a lie Agent Rossi. The lovely Agent Beckett is most definitely not going to be fine."

"Are you going to tell me what you want? Or is it really that you have no idea what you want? That you're making all of this up as you go along? You've got both Finn and I in here, our team outside. If you kill us there is no way you're getting out of here alive."

"And if I don't kill you, then you really expect me to believe that your team will let me out of here alive?"

"We abide by the law, not break it."

"Oh and you're so self righteous aren't you Agent Rossi? Exactly how many marriages have you had and how many of those have failed? So now you seem to be trying out a younger model. I would congratulate you if I weren't so sickened by it. I wonder what it is that Agent Beckett sees in you exactly? Do you think it could be something to do with your mansion, your money?"

"I am not going to argue with you about something you don't know anything about. You have us here now tell us what you're planning."

Finn groaned and stretched on the bed. She dislodged Rossi from his perch on the bed. He caught himself before he fell and sat back on the bed. Finn had flipped herself on to her side so she was facing in to the room.

"So you're back in the land of the living Agent Beckett. So nice of you to make the effort"

"Fuck you Steeple."

"Ooh feisty. I'm beginning to understand what you see in her Agent Rossi. Still having difficulty with the other way round though."

Finn coughed and doubled up on the bed.

"Will you give her some water Steeple?" Rossi stood and walked towards Steeple.

"Agent Rossi, don't come any closer. I'm warning you."

The next few seconds was a blur. Rossi charged towards Steeple, aiming to knock him to the ground but Steeple sidestepped him and charged straight for Finn. Finn sat upright on the bed and flicked open the knife she had pulled from Rossi's back. Her plan had been to stand and use all of her strength to stab Steeple but he was too fast and his momentum was too great. He slammed in to her and pushed her into the wall, pinning her against him. Finn screamed and steeple grunted. Rossi pulled himself up from the floor too late to scream out a warning to Finn. He watched in horror as Steeple flew at her.

"Rossi, help me."

Rossi ran towards the bed and grabbed Steeple by the shirt collar. He pulled hard and stumbled when he found no resistance. Steeple fell backwards on to the floor with Rossi's knife sticking out of his chest.

Finn couldn't see who was coming to visit her because of the huge bunch of flowers that filled the doorway. She knew it wasn't Rossi as he hadn't left her side since he helped her out of the garage. He sat next to her right now, holding her hands and watching her laugh at Morgan who had managed to struggle through the door with the flowers and then Reid who was having less luck trying to get a gigantic purple teddy bear in to her room. When everyone had filed in there was hardly any space for any of them to move. But none of them seemed to mind; they were just extremely glad that she was out and she was safe.

"The flowers were Hotch's idea," said Morgan as he put them on her bedside table. "The teddy, well you can probably guess that that particular idea belongs to Miss Garcia."

"They're both wonderful. Thank you."

"So are you guys ready to tell us what went down yesterday?" asked Reid

"Honey, you don't have to go through this now if you don't want to?"

"David, I'm fine. Stop worrying." Finn took his hand and held it gently.

"You do know that there's only two to a bed…." the nurse stopped before she said anything else having been confronted by several FBI ids. "Sorry, carry on."

"I knew that I couldn't go in armed but there was no way I was going in without anything at all against that madman." Rossi started. "so I hid a knife underneath my vest, hoping that Steeple wouldn't feel it through the vest. What I also had in my pocket was a paperclip. When I went in to the room and leant over Finn I slipped the paperclip in to her hand and then, when I had my back to her, I pulled the knife down just enough to let her know that it was there."

"Rossi kept Steeple occupied just enough for me to be able to get the cuffs undone with the paperclip."

"Wait a minute." said Reid. "That's not possible."

"Well obviously boy wonder it is because that's what happened. And really, I can pick any lock with more or less anything. Anyway, I picked the cuffs, coughed, pulled the knife from underneath Rossi's vest at the same time as he started moving towards Steeple. Steeple moved around him and came straight for me. I didn't have time to react or prepare or move but I didn't need to because the force of Steeple crashing in to me pushed the knife in to his chest."

"Wow." Garcia sat on the edge of the bed, looking decidedly green.

"Hey PG, it's all good. Nothing bad happened."

"But it could have."

"Oh sweetie, but it didn't." Finn leant up and hugged PG tight.

"Right guys. Let's give Finn and Rossi some space." Hotch ushered the team out of the hospital room.

Finn lay back on the pillows and closed her eyes when the team had left.

"Bella, go to sleep." Rossi leant over and pushed Finn's hair out of her face. Finn caught his hand.

"Will you be here when I wake up?"

"Always bella. Always and forever."

"I love you David Rossi."

"I love you too Finn Beckett. Now get some sleep bella. Who knows what tomorrow may bring."

THE END

**More or less one year after I started it I've finished it! I never thought it would take that long. I could have gone on and on with this and ended up with Rossi marrying Finn and them living happily ever after and all that stuff but I have to end it somewhere and I think this is the place.**

**Hope you enjoyed.**


End file.
